Hell Hath no Fury: An Ice Queen's Saga
by Hobbit
Summary: A Temporal conspiracy. An interdimensional cold war. The first grumblings of war in a country far away from mainstream civilization. And all this is placed squarely in the lap of future Elite Lorelei Belle Winters. Rated T for Mass Warfare. Complete.
1. A Date with Destiny

As promised, I have for you here the Extended Version of Chapter 1. Actually, Chapter 1 Extended; Part 1 of 3

I'd like to thank shadow/phantomness for the review, and I hope that he likes this extended versions much more than the original. If he prefers the original…also, I noticed that he reviewed another of my fics, Operation: Celebi. This is actually a prequel to that one, and what I have up for O:C I'm going to be toss that out the window because it sucks.

grins

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A dark figure crept into Silph Company's headquarters in Saffron City, making sure that he couldn't be seen. He wasn't worried that he would be seen, his Porygon would see to that. He just had to make it there, insert a disk, take it out, and get out, without being seen. He had to be careful, though, or people might recognize him. Not that he'd become famous for several more years, but he still had to be careful.

And, above all, he couldn't let anyone see his Porygon. They hadn't developed it yet, he'd been told before he'd been sent back in time, they were just in the Pokémon's planning stages. They wouldn't have an actual Porygon for nearly another ten years. If they saw the Porygon, he could easily change more history than he was supposed to.

He wasn't exactly sure why he'd been assigned this mission, but he'd been told that it was of the ultimate import that he do it. Unfortunately, that meant that he was cutting himself off from his own timeline forever. Because he'd fixed the problem, the people his masters were now would never become who they had been to him, but would instead leave normal lives, without having to fear—

He glanced around, looking for the Psychic Pokémon that routinely guarded secure places such as these in the future. If he had been there instead of where he was, and had thought such thoughts as he just had, they would have killed him instantly.

But that was the second part of his assignment. He could not allow the Dark Queen to rise to power. The Altan would tear apart everything his masters in what had been Kanto had striven to protect. She would kill half of the world's human population, and three-quarters of the world's Pokemon population in The War.

No, he would not let that happen. He had to kill her. He had to kill the Dark Queen before she could even begin to consolidate her power on the Twin Leagues. Of course, the Twin Leagues were still referred to as the Johto and Indigo Leagues here, eighteen years past from the year he had come. According to history, this was the only way to change the course of events. Within two years, if he failed, the world would be irrevocably on the path to destruction, and nothing he, nor anyone else could do, would do anything to change that.

It was his job, and that of his partner, to see that that wouldn't happen. It was harder for her, though, because she was more widely known, even in this time period. If anyone were to see her, they would have to die, because if they saw her and got word out, the game would be up, and the Invasions would begin.

That could not be allowed.

The boy crept to the door, and, without a sound, it opened under Porygon's command, and the brown-haired teenager passed through. He cast about, looking for the computer that he would need, went over to it, and activated it. He heard a soft click as Porygon closed the door, and then the lights came up. Quickly, the boy's hands moved over the keyboard, inputting the necessary commands. Within five minutes, it was done.

In another ten, the boy was outside of the city, and moving at a dead run for the Saffron City's outskirts, his weathered hat pulled low over his face. He smiled, beneath the bandana that hid the lower half of his face. He'd have six years to plan the next operation. He only hoped that it took longer than that for the changes to filter through the timeline, or he and his partner would both vanish, as if they'd never been.

According to the scientists who'd studied the temporal sciences, he'd have six and a half years to continue his existence, if he took the path upon which he had just begun irrevocable changes. There was no going back now. There was just the road ahead, and the hope that they'd be able to change the future for the better.

If they failed, however…

The boy shook his head, not wanting to think of such things. He would succeed. Failure was not an option. He WOULD complete his objective, or die trying.

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The glare of the lights, the roar of the crowd, the feeling of the rough padding underneath of her. It was enough to make a girl cry, Lorelei thought. She watched her opponent carefully, not wanting to let her opponent get the best of her. She had trained hard all year for the tournament, and she wouldn't let him take it away now.

She was Lorelei Belle Winters, three-time champion of the tournament in the five to ten category of the Allnian National Tournament. If she won this match, then she would have broken the record for the number of consecutive wins by a person in her age group.

As almost everyone in the non-League countries knew, the Allnian National Tournament of Alto was a very elite tournament. One in which only a small percent of those that attempted to enter would actually be able to compete. Once there, the competition was stiff, and only the best would make it past the first round.

While the competition was open to anyone from abroad, those who entered the contest were generally from Alto. The handful that made it into the tournament internationally were generally excellent scrappers. Sometimes they were boxers, and sometimes they were wrestlers, but only rarely were they Pokémon Trainers.

The reason for that was simple. Pokémon were not allowed to compete in the tournament, despite the fact that Alto had its own successful Pokémon League. The founders of the Allnian National Tournament did not want it to be just another contest that tested a person's knowledge, strategic prowess, or being able to shout orders quickly; they wanted it to be an evaluation of the individual's physical prowess.

For this reason, Pokémon were forbidden to enter the rink, and were forced to watch in a special Pokémon section of the stands, surrounded by psionic inhibitors and Force Fields to prevent interference in the matches.

Lorelei stared at her opponent, feeling her lungs gasping for air. It had been a long match, and she wasn't sure if she could win. If she timed everything just right, and didn't make too many mistakes, then maybe she'd be able to win. But then again, maybe not. She noticed the gleam of determination in her opponent's eyes, offset by the mixture of sweat and blood that poured down his face, like, she knew, the fluid that was dripping down her face as well.

Her opponent's name was Bruno. Apparently he was a superb Pokemon fighter, specializing in Fighting types. He probably trained with his Pokemon, Lorelei guessed, or he probably wouldn't have such quick reflexes. He had surprised her in the beginning of the match because of his sheer power. That was, really, his only weakness. He'd trained up, and now he was strong, true, but he couldn't move as quickly as she could. She'd managed to take advantage of that, but he'd landed quite a few good hits on her.

Now it was an endurance contest. Who could last the longest. They were both losing blood, and within ten minutes, Lorelei guessed, neither of them would be able to fight anymore. But that was all right, the battle would be decided long before then. In this match, ten minutes was an eternity.

She didn't have to look around to remember what the battlefield looked like. It was a raised fifty square-yard square, with steps going up to the raised area from all four sides. If either she or Bruno were to step off of the raised area, they would lose.

Suddenly, the boy was charging at her. Lorelei tried to dance out of the way, but the boy was too fast. His fist struck the side of her jaw, and she flipped in the air, and came crashing down onto the ground, but was already moving her feet, trapping his legs between hers, and taking him down with her.

Lorelei rolled away, and got up, wincing as her jaw popped. She raised her fists wearily, and darted forward. Bruno was getting up, and raised a fist towards her. Lorelei, unable to slow herself down, ran directly into his outstretched arm, and was knocked down again.

She gritted her teeth, and rolled backwards, narrowly missing Bruno's kick. When her weight came fully onto her hands, she pushed off, and, executing a flip, landed on her feet in a defensive position. Lorelei swallowed, and hoped that she was standing where she was hoping she was standing. It had become obvious to her that she wouldn't be able to beat Bruno by martial arts, the kid was just too good. But maybe, if she used some non-standard tactics, she might have a chance at winning the title again this year.

All she needed was Bruno to attack her. She didn't have long to wait. Within four seconds of her having gotten back onto her feet, Bruno was charging her. She waited until he was nearly upon her, then moved out of the way, and gave him a push. Surprised, Bruno's momentum kept him going, and he tumbled down the stairs, and onto the ground.

The buzzer sounded, and Lorelei smiled. She had won! For the fourth year in a row! She looked over at the Pokemon enclosure, and saw the force fields drop, and her Sneasel, followed closely by the rest of her team, ran towards her. She looked towards her opponent, and found him glaring at her. Somehow, she had the feeling that some day, they would meet again.

Then, suddenly, she was out of breath, and she could feel the impacts of the blows that she had taken throughout the battle. Her lungs felt as if they were on fire, her stomach as if someone had just run over it, and her jaw was so sore that she wasn't sure if she was able to talk.

Then her legs gave out, and she fell towards the ground, but soft, furry hands caught her, and helped her back to her feet. She looked at her Sneasel and gave him an appreciative smile, then turned shakily to the crowd, and raised one aching arm, to their approving roar.

"And the winner of the Five to Ten Age Category, in the Altan National Allnian Tournament is," she heard the announcer say over the loudspeaker, and smiled, knowing that she'd just gone down in history, "for the fourth year in a row, Lorelei Belle Winters!" The girl heard the loudspeaker boom, and heard the crowd roar even louder, and she smiled as best she could. "That's a new record, folks," the announcer continued, "No one has ever won four consecutive years in a row in the Five to Ten Category." She wasn't smiling because of them, it was because once again, she had beaten the odds, and won the National Championship.

Even if she hadn't exactly beaten Bruno. But that was how she did things. She didn't approach things head on. She came in from the side, figured out how to beat the system, and took advantage of any minor advantages she could get. Only if there weren't any other options, would she take a frontal approach.

And, once again, her philosophy had allowed her to carry the day. She smiled, basking in the moment. She couldn't really enjoy it, however, because somewhere in the back of her mind, she wondered when the way she lived at her life would get her in trouble.

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Lorelei looked up from her bandaged arm, and up at her family's doctor. He'd actually been assigned to her the first year she'd competed, and, since then, he'd been hired full-time. He was one of the best doctors in Alto, and had been working for the Tournament for most of his career.

True, Doctor Strobold wasn't THAT old, she thought to herself, probably somewhere in his thirties. He was pretty tall though, but Lorelei didn't mind that much. He was a good doctor. "There," he said, smiling at her, "In a week or two, you'll be as good as new. Except for the cut you got from that roll you did towards the end."

Lorelei looked over at the large mirror in the room, and smiled at her reflection. She had bruises all over her face, her left arm was in a sling, her right was bandaged, and she had a nasty cut along her cheek. She couldn't remember feeling it open, but Strobold had insisted that it had occurred when she had gotten into position to beat Bruno. "Is it gonna leave a scar?" she asked, raising her right hand up to touch the line of dried blood, as if fascinated by it.

Strobold shook his head, "I'm afraid it will," he said, "There's nothing I can do about that. If you let me get a Blissey or a Healtia in here, you'd be back to normal within a week." He said, looking slightly annoyed that she had refused any treatment except what he could do by himself. Lorelei stared at him for a couple seconds, and he chuckled, "Ah well. I don't think there's anything else I can do. You better get going," he said, smiling, "You've got a press conference to go to."

Lorelei grinned. Of course. She'd nearly forgotten about the Tournament Press Conference. The winner of the tournament's age groups would host it. The Five to Ten category was the first age division to finish, so she'd kick things off. She'd have about an hour until the Eleven to Fourteen age category finished their championship, if the last several years were any indication.

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Lorelei tugged at her jacket over her right arm, trying to hide as much of the bandage as she could. She hated that her left arm was in a sling, but there wasn't much that she could do about it. She sat in a limousine, which was taking her back to her house. It wasn't as much a house as a mansion, really.

She didn't really like it, but it was a place to call home. It was the largest house on the largest spread of privately owned land on the island of Alto, but Lorelei didn't really care. True, it was nice that she had the equivalent of her own apartment to call her own, and the mansion had its own Nurse Joy and Pokémon Professor to help her with the Pokémon she was raising.

Within a few years, she was sure, she'd be allowed to set out and try to defeat the gym leaders of the Altan League. Maybe then she'd be able to join the elite group of trainers within Alto known as the Skye Isle Club. True, she wouldn't be truly be able to be a member until she was eighteen, but it was most definitely a worthy goal.

She glanced down at the open book on her lap, made a face, and slapped it shut. The red hue of the back cover of the Indigo League Rulebook stared up at her, and she sighed. She would have gone to Kanto in a few days if it hadn't been for that stupid rule. She'd been catching and training Pokémon for the last several years, and now she'd discovered that the minimum age for Pokémon training was ten! Further, any Pokémon she would have caught before she was ten, she wouldn't be able to use in the League. That meant that she'd have to start completely over, with an entirely new team.

She would enter the Indigo League, Lorelei thought to herself, but not until she was ready. She glanced across the limousine at her Sneasel, who stared back at her. He had, according to both Nurse Joy and Professor Silph, grandson of the founder of Silph Company, chosen a mate from one of the Professor's Sneasels, and that it would be a matter of time before Sneasel's mate had little Sneasel running around.

She shook her head, and grinned. Whoever had started that "Pokemon hatch from eggs" theory was definitely mistaken. Well, for most Pokemon, anyway. Some, such as birds and reptiles, did hatch from eggs, but the vast majority of Pokemon were born as miniature versions of their parents, with some minor exceptions.

It would be nice, she considered, to have little Sneasel. She could start up an all-Sneasel team, and have them be her starters. True, she'd have massive weaknesses to Blaziken, and other Fighting or Fire types, but for the first few gyms, she probably wouldn't have any problems. Kanto's first three gyms in Viridian City, Pewter City, and Cerulean City were, after all, Ground, Rock, and Water, respectively. The Cerulean Gym Leader, or, rather, the best Cerulean Gym Leader used Starmie and Staryu, so she'd have an advantage, at least for those Pokemon. Whether she'd be able to beat the others would depend upon her skill as a trainer, and how well she'd trained her team by then.

She smiled, and leaned back into the soft leather of the cushions, and closed her eyes. She tried to ignore the aching from all over her body, and drifted off to sleep, dreaming of battles in Kanto, with an all-Sneasel team, defeating trainer after trainer. She had made it to Cerulean City, and was just about to challenge the gym leader when her driver woke her up, and told her that she was at her house.

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Professor Antonio Silph peered through the microscope. It was fascinating, the things that he and his fellow Silph Company colleagues were discovering every day. Right now, he and his team were studying Spinarak and Ariados, trying to discover the chemical reaction that produced their silk-like webs.

If it were possible to artificially create, and possibly strengthen the webs, then it might be possible to use the same concepts to create strong, nearly unbreakable tapestries. That had been his thesis, when he had started the project, anyway. The more he studied, the less he doubted that he could do such a thing. He'd been a fool to think that he could synthesize Spinarak web.

He rubbed his eyes, as if trying to obliterate the feeling that he needed to get some rest, and glanced at his watch. Had it really been nearly a day and a half since he'd last slept? He sighed, and had to admit to himself that it probably had been. He had thought that he was so close to the completion of the project, after so many years…

But now, it looked just the opposite. It didn't look like he'd be able to now. He and his team had managed to find the chemicals that were produced afterwards, but he could not find how the web was made. It was as if it somehow appeared out of thin air.

He glanced around, and spotted Micheal Carentamous coming in through the doors. "Take over," he said, jabbing a finger back in the direction of the microscope, "I'm gonna need to get some coffee. I shouldn't be more than fifteen minutes."

Mike grinned, and nodded eagerly. Nice kid, just out of college, but he still had to learn that he wasn't gonna make the biggest discovery of his generation within the first week of his internship. How he had made it through High School and college with that last name, however, Antonio wasn't sure. He must have been the brunt of many jokes.

Antonio grinned and walked out the door, heading for the mansion's Pokemon Center, and the rather strong coffee that Nurse Joy always had brewed there. Maybe he'd stay a little longer than he'd planned. Nurse Joy was, after all, very attractive. What would it hurt to stay a couple of extra minutes? It's not like his research was going to pan out anything good, or anything.

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Lorelei heard her mother call her for supper, and sighed. She had just gotten started reading the rules of the Altan League, and she had wanted to get a good distance into it before she put it down. She sighed. The Altan League would only let her use two of her five-Pokémon team, but it was better than nothing, especially because she got to choose which two to use in competition.

She looked at the ceiling. Obviously, she'd choose Sneasel, but which other Pokémon? Entrophen, Duskull, Haunter, or Graveller? She'd have to think about it.

Lorelei started as she suddenly remembered that her mother had called her to supper. It would be a special supper, too! Her brother would be there. He'd been gone for several months, attending a business college. He'd graduated a week previously, and had returned to Fogh for a celebration, and her tournament.

As she hurried down the staircase, she considered how amazing her brother was. Somehow, while studying hard in business college, he'd somehow found the time to get a job at Silph Company's Management branch, and have an active social life as well, all the while maintaining a good grade point average. Brandon was a fun brother. He always brought her home something nice from his school in Hoenn, plus, the one time she'd visited him in the archipelago country, he'd let her drive his car around a parking lot. That had been lots of fun.

Now he was home, and he was going to stay home. Silph company had approved his transfer request to Alto, and he had worked his way up to nearly her father's position. It was really quite an impressive achievement.

Lorelei heard what sounded like Nurse Joy and Professor Silph talking in the Pokemon Center, and glanced in quickly as she passed it, and grinned as she saw both of them sitting down across from each other, drinking coffee. Their relationship had been progressing romantically for several months, now, though neither apparently realized it, but this was the first time she'd actually seen them talking with each other outside of what their professions demanded of them.

Nurse Joy actually worked nearly full-time, due to her handling a fair percentage of all the non-critical cases that came into the main Fogh Pokemon Center, and it's outlying Centers. When she had gotten back from the tournament, Silph had told her that Sneasel's mate was pregnant, and it would be about a two months before the Sneasel babies would be born.

Lorelei couldn't wait. She'd be out of the sling and bandage long before that, so she'd be able to take better care of them. From what she'd heard, Sneasel were the best Pokemon for getting out of enclosures. She'd have to be at the top of her game to keep track of them all. Either that, or get Professor Silph to inject sub-dermal locating chips into each one.

Lorelei jumped down the last several stairs, and hurried around the last corner to the dining room. What she saw was far beyond what she had ever imagined. Her mother and father were staring at Brandon, who was glaring at her father. Nobody moved, and Lorelei thought of the old expression about cutting tension with a knife. It was certainly accurate now.

She cleared her throat, and her family jumped, then looked at her. "Um," she asked quietly, "Did I miss something?"

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Silph walked back into the lab, smiling to himself. He'd had a nice cup of coffee with Nurse Joy, and had had a nice conversation, as well. It was always nice, talking to her. She was a good conversationalist. And her knowledge of Pokemon anatomy and biology was nice, because he could discuss his research with her, and she would understand perfectly.

Antonio was jolted out of his reverie by his assistant, who had motioned excitedly for him to come over to the microscope where he had been fifteen minutes before. "Professor!" the young man exclaimed excitedly, "I've discovered it! I've found where the reaction takes place!"

The Professor stared at his underling in disbelief. This had to be a joke. There was no way that this could be happening. There was just no way. It was a joke. Yeah, that was it. Mike was playing a trick on him. There was no way that he could be serious.

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Lorelei looked around the table suspiciously. No one was making eye contact with her. Well, Brandon was, but not for very long. Something was up. She shoveled another mouthful of rice into her mouth, and reached for her glass of water.

This was very odd. The tension in the room hadn't let up when she had started eating. If anything, it had increased. That meant that whatever was going on involved her, she guessed. But what exactly could be this bad? It was like the time her then-Geodude, having just learned Dig from an experimental Technical Machine, had dug up her mother's flower bed.

Except then she hadn't been quiet. She'd just yelled at her for just under a half hour. So it was something more serious, then. What could that be, though?

Lorelei swallowed the rice, took a drink of water, and glanced at her father, and noticed that both he and her mother were looking at her, but both quickly looked away. She sighed and slammed her glass down onto the table. "All right," she demanded, "What did I do?"

Her father grimaced, and glanced at her mother. Brandon shook his head, and blurted out, "They're moving, Lorelei. That's what they don't want to tell you. They're leaving Alto behind."

Lorelei felt her blood run cold, and looked to her father, "Is this true?" she asked quietly, forcing herself not to shout about how unfair it was until she knew whether or not it was true.

"Yes," her father said, still not making eye contact, "We're moving away from Alto. I can't see us returning in the foreseeable future. I've been offered a job as a national supervisor. I had to take it."

Lorelei felt the blood drain from her face, and actually hearing the words spoken from her father somehow took away all of her motivation to fight. "Don't worry," she heard her mother say, "It won't be that bad. You'll make new friends, and I hear the schools there are very good. And they have an excellent League."

Lorelei gripped the arms of her chair to keep herself upright, and forced herself to ask the questions she'd been dreading, "How long?" she whispered, "How long until we move?"

"I gave me three week's notice today. We'll take a week to pack things up," her father said, staring down at his plate, but looking as if he weren't hungry anymore, "So just over a month."

"But," Lorelei said, "The Sneasel's children will be born in two months," she whispered, "Will we be able to take Sneasel's mate with us?"

Her parents looked at one another, but didn't say anything. "Tell her," her brother said suddenly, "Tell her where we're moving to, and why she can't take any of her Pokemon with her."

Lorelei's head shot up at that, and her eyes were as wide as they could go. "What?" she demanded, "I can't bring my team with me?"

Her mother took a deep breath, and replied, "Because we're moving to Kanto."

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Well…

Thank you for reading, and may the spirit of reviewing be with you.

I hope to have part 2/3 of the Extended Chapter 1 up very soon, as I do have all of Chapter 1 finished.

I apologize for all the "8"s, but for some reason the preview thing hasn't been letting me use other symbols to separate scenes...

sighs

If anyone knows how I can fix that, please let me know.


	2. Important Author's Note

Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to Hell Hath no Fury: an Ice Queen's Saga. As you can see from the reviews, I have juggled this story around a little bit. Before, I had the original and Extended versions of this fic, but now I'm just going to have the Extended Version in this thread.

Now, with that said, I'd like to give you the background information you will need to get the most out of this work of fiction. There are two main sections that you need to know about. Everything else SHOULD be explained elsewhere in the fic.

The two categories are my created countries and my created teams. Also, please note that this is based mainly on the game, and NOT on the anime. While I am using quite a lot of anime sources for this, it is mainly from the game, with a large dose of my own imagination (this is why I'm going to keep Lorelei's home country as Alto, and not the Orange Islands. Sorry, Farla.).

My Created Countries:

This fic will deal mainly with two major countries. Nuschantz and Alto. However, at least five more will be mentioned in this fic. I'll explain about four of them for you here, and detail the remaining three when we get to that point.

Major Countries:

1) Alto. At the outset of the fic, Lorelei will be in this country, as it is her home. Alto is an island country home to the largest, most powerful air force in the world. Because of this, the natives generally inhabit flying types (no, I'm not making the Falkners be from Alto, sorry). All of their cities are named after various types of clouds. Such as Cumulo, Stratun, Smogh (smog), Fogh (fog), etc. Their culture is very heavily military centric, but not as much as Tintia (see below). However, they do still have a league, known as the Skye League (after a small island off the coast of Alto called the Isle of Skye). It is, however, intensely difficult. Nearly five times as difficult as Kanto's Indigo League.

2) Nuschantz. The ski capital of the Pokemon World, unit is known as the ski capital of the world, and is the vacation favorite of the rich, famous, and newly married. It is a rough, rugged country with no major roads or major airports, except in the "capitol," the Verin Retreat. That's another thing. They don't have cities. They have ski resorts. While there are nearly a hundred scattered around the country, there are twelve major ski resorts. And you don't generally walk from resort to resort. You don't fly, you don't really go anywhere under your own power. Nuschantz has a very sophisticated system of Teleportat-enabled Jynx throughout the country, allowing for the instantaneous travel of a person, Pokemon, or thing to anywhere in the country that is in range of the Jynx stations. This is generally within ten miles or so of each station. Nuschantz comes complete with its own unique team, Team Blizzard (see below).

Minor Countries:

3) Tintia. Extremely xenophobic, they allow no more than five hundred non-citizens across their borders every year. This includes Pokemon Professors, ambassadors, and ordinary trainers. They boast the strongest military in the world, and also the strongest rival in the world (see Engara, below). Tintians are generally thought of as thugs and gangsters, but they are generally just like other people. Some are nice, and some are bad. Most of them are good, hardworking people, however.

4) Engara. The bullies of the international world, they have the second strongest military in the world, and a bone to pick with Tintia. The country is ruled by a theocracy, which preaches that sometime in the future, an extremely powerful Pokemon or human known as Lont will return to the Pokemon world and give inconceivable power to his faithful. For centuries the Engarans have tried to purify the world, to allow them to be a part of Lont's kingdom. They are extremely zealous, and want to take over the world because of this. The only thing that has prevented them from doing this overtly is Tintia. The Tintians have defeated them time after time, and prevented them from invading any other country. However, the Engarans have the largest special operations branch in the world. It is theorized that Team Rocket (at this time, part of a much larger corporation called Specter Corp, see Specter Corp Shadow Warriors, below), Team Aqua, Team Magma, and the myriad other teams all receive a large percentage of their funding from this country.

My Created Teams:

In this fic, we will be dealing with two major created teams and one relatively minor. It might not even be mentioned at all.

1) Team Blizzard. Founded as a political party in the country of Nuschantz, it has grown to the point that it has literally thousands of followers. These followers do not always act in the best interests of the team's founder, Gertal, and many have generally made themselves a nuisance around Nuschantz. Because of this, the entire team has been branded an enemy of the state, and been actively hunted. Team Blizzard has two major bases. One, a major fortress is hidden. No one really knows where it is, except for the Blizzards, and is nearly impervious to all but an all-out attack by hundreds of thousands of men. The second base is on the Effeulan border (explained later. Basically, there's a civil war. Pokemon and their talents on one side, and humans and their technology on the other), and is also secret. However, it is much smaller, and not defended as well.

2) Specter Corporation Shadow Warriors. The Shadow Warriors began when Specter Corporation had a monopoly on Pokemon technology, and Silph Company began to blossom very quickly. At first, they were just thugs that threatened Silph company management, but when htat began attracting the attention of the Global Police, the Shadow Warriors were born. An elite group of men and women, they use the latest Specter Corporation technology to further their single purpose—to be rich. By any means necessary. Many of the operatives are Engaran, and have been trained in Engara. As such, they are truly excellent agents, and are fairly high up in the Shadow Warrior's ranks. Most such agents believe in Lont (see Engara, above), and their actions reflect that philosophy.

3) Team Ivy. Not a team in the regular sense of the word, Team Ivy is a company of the most brilliant scientists on the Pokémon world, gathered together with one common goal—to learn more, protect, and improve plant life wherever they go. As their name suggests, they use only grass types. Not really that important, but I thought I'd toss it in to show you that I don't just make up martial Pokémon teams.


	3. The Move

"We're doing what?" Lorelei asked in disbelief, not wanting to believe what she had just heard. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she heard them talking, but she was too overwhelmed to hear them. According to her parents, they were going to move to Kanto, a place where she could not use any of the Pokémon she had caught in the last four years. She had been planning on using two of those Pokémon in the Altan League, which, according to the rules, she was allowed.

According to Kanto's strict Pokémon battling laws, Pokémon caught by a person under the age of ten, once brought to Kanto, did not belong to the trainer, if the trainer became a Kantan citizen. They were, in a very real sense, wild Pokémon. The law had been put in place because the starting age of the Indigo League—Kanto's Pokémon Training League—was ten. Therefore, if she moved to Kanto, she'd have to leave all four of her Pokémon behind.

But if her parents did, in fact, mean what they were saying, then she would be moving away from everything she had ever known. The only life she had ever known. The only friends she had ever known. From the only Pokémon team she'd ever known. That was the worst part.

For a fleeting moment, Lorelei wondered if she could stay behind with her brother, but a glance at her parents told her that they were determined to bring her with them. So that was it, then. She was being ripped from her life, and being set down in some Kantan town to try to put her life back together.

It couldn't be. No. She'd worked too hard for this. She was in the running for the Internationals this year. If she moved to Kanto, she wouldn't be able to participate. The Internationals, as almost every person in Alto knew, were a series of events such as boxing, melee scrapping, Pokémon battling, and others to test the abilities of each contestant. Obviously, she wouldn't be able to enter all of the events, but she had been hoping—had been planning on attending to compete in one or two events.

"It's not fair," she said quietly, and realized that all conversation had stopped. Then she realized that she had said the words out loud. "It's not fair," she repeated, louder and more adamant this time, "I'm not going to Kanto. I'm staying here, and I don't care what you say."

With that, Lorelei got up so fast her chair tipped over backwards, and ran from the room before anyone could stop her. Brandon sighed and put down silverware with a clatter. "I hope you're happy," he said darkly, and got up, albeit slower than Lorelei, and followed Lorelei out the door.

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Lorelei walked along the path, glancing back at her house only once. She sighed. All she had ever wanted to do was to try to join the Altan Pokémon League, and now that opportunity was being taken from her. There had to be some way that she'd be able to stay here in Alto. There had to be. All she had to do was find it.

She looked up at the sky, and admired the freshly darkened sky. Faint tinges of tangerine and ruby still graced the sky at the very utmost of the horizon, but, for the most part, night had begun its nightly march. She heard a movement to her right and turned to see her Duskull appear. She smiled and began to walk again.

Duskull, for it's part, fell into step behind her, and said nothing. It seemed to sense that she had a lot to think about, and didn't want to bother her. For some reason, it always seemed to be able to detect her moods. Maybe she should have listened more carefully to Professor Silph when he had lectured her on the varying degrees of telepathic abilities. Maybe then she'd be able to put a name to what Duskull was.

She smiled slightly, remembering how she and Duskull had first met. She had just captured her first Pokémon, Sneasel, with one of Brandon's "borrowed" Pokémon, and she had been eager for a fight. It had been nearly dark, and the first Pokémon she had spotted was Duskull. She kept trying to get it to fight her, but the Ghost-type had dodged every attack Sneasel had unleashed, and had refused to retaliate.

Then, after she'd given up trying to battle it, she returned home to scolding and a one-month grounding for catching a Pokémon before she was the right age, and borrowing one of Brandon's Pokémon without his permission. His Scyther was fine, except for the fact that its right wing stayed frozen for three entire days. That night, she had woken up, and Duskull was in her room. She had been angry, and somehow Duskull had made her feel less angry. Probably because of it's talent, whatever it was called.

Lorelei smiled and felt the ground beneath her feet growing soft. She was nearly there. Haunter was probably there, as she rarely left the Special Place, and Graveller was probably looking after his little Geodudes in the rocky area of the Winters grounds, on the other side of the compound. That left Entrophen. Where was he?

He was probably wandering around the Winters Estate, and that meant that unless she had a Psychic, she'd never know unless she could see him. He'd gotten quieter than usual lately, and Lorelei attributed that to his relative old age. He was nearly four and a half years old. That meant that he only had about six months left to live. Her parents, she was sure, would allow her to take him to Kanto with her, but that was probably it.

Lorelei spotted the thick hedge that surrounded the Special Place up ahead, and smiled softly. How old had she been when she'd discovered this place? Five, six years old? This was where she had met Haunter. She had tried to attack him with Duskull, but the Haunter had merely fled, and returned a few minutes later. After several more attempts to attack and/or capture Haunter, she had let the Pokémon be.

Duskull had, over the course of several years, befriended Haunter, and had eventually convinced the other Ghost-type Pokemon to join her team. She hadn't figured out why until she had seen the affectionate looks the two shared when they thought she wasn't looking. She smiled. She was glad that they had managed to find happiness.

Even if she still didn't know what was so special about this spot to Haunter, just that whenever they came home from a trip, and she released her Pokémon, Haunter would come to this place and never move, unless he had to go somewhere. That was the nice thing about being a ghost, Lorelei considered, you didn't have to sleep, and you didn't have to eat. Must be really nice.

She got down onto her stomach and began crawling under the thorns that surrounded her special place, and, after a few moments, passed through to the other side. She got to her feet, and looked around.

Most people had told her that the whole place was just a thick, solid growth of thorns, with nothing inside of it. For several years, she had believed them. Then, one day, when she was feeling more rebellious than normal, she had crawled under the thorns, and had come out to the other side. That had been, of course, the day that she'd first tried to capture Haunter.

She couldn't have even considered crawling underneath the obstacle if she hadn't broken down and decided that yes, she would let a Blissey heal her. She preferred to let her body do its own healing, but at times she recognized that it needed a little help. As it was, she was as good as new.

She slithered under the last of the thorns, feeling several catch several places in her clothing, and grimaced as she realized just how far she had come from that naïve little wannabe trainer four years before. She doubted that she would stop growing anytime soon, and that made her want to scream and demand that she be frozen in time for as long as she wanted to be.

She didn't want anything to change. She didn't want Entrophen to die in half a year. She didn't want to move to Kanto. She didn't want to leave her home here. She didn't want to wake up one morning in a strange bed, and realize that she was hundreds of miles from where she was born.

Lorelei shook her head, closed her eyes, and mentally kicked herself. She'd come here to forget everything, not try to think about them. She sighed, and breathed in the air that always seemed to be fresh in here, and the smell of a babbling stream. It was odd, but somehow this spot always seemed to calm her down.

She opened her eyes and saw Haunter hovering in the exact center of the small hiding place (she'd actually brought a tape measure once, and it had confirmed that Haunter hovered over the exact center of Lorelei's tiny niche), over the small river that flowed through the tiny hollow, dividing it into two flower-covered halves. On the side upon which Lorelei was lying, there was also a small rock, and it was there that she usually sat, and just thought, sometimes for hours.

She got up and walked over to the stone, and looked up to see Duskull coming down from over the hedge, as she always did. Because some parts of the Ghost-type were solid, Duskull was too big to go under the hedge, and instead always flew over when she was sure that no one was watching.

Lorelei bit her lip as she began thinking about her situation. How exactly could she get out of going to Kanto? She could pack her bags and run away, but that wouldn't work, because as long as she stayed in Alto, the Psychic Array that the Global Police used would find her nearly instantaneously.

She could try to fly out of the country, but she was pretty sure that the only people that wouldn't take her or turn her into the Global Police would be unsavory. And the same would also be true of trying to take a boat out of Alto. So there was no hope of trying to escape Alto before they moved. If she tried to feign serious illness, Antonio Silph or the Winter's Nurse Joy would know almost immediately that she was faking it.

Slowly, it dawned upon Lorelei that despite any of her best efforts, there was no way that she could avoid moving to Kanto. There was no stopping it. Just like there was no stopping Grandpa Winters from eating all the lettuce and nothing else at salad bars. Or from stopping Grandma Winters marching up to the restaurant managers at the restaurant that had the salad bar was and demanding to know where the drinks were, because it was a bar, wasn't it?

Then an idea sparked into existence. The only way to convince her parents to move back to Kanto would be to be as nice as possible to them in the time she still had left in Alto, then making their lives miserable once they began their trip to Kanto. There was no way that they'd stay there very long once she started acting up really badly, was there?

She grinned. And if she made it to Kanto, she'd be eligible to get her Pokémon license, right? And once she got that, she could run off and never be seen again! It was the perfect plan.

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Lorelei's eyes glittered as the school bus pulled up in front of her house. She could have ridden in her family's limousine to school, but she didn't really like flaunting that her family was rich.

Besides, she got to spend more time with her friends this way. As she got on the bus, she ignored the spontaneous applause and cheering, and made her way to her friend Sabrina Williams, a foreign exchange student from Kanto. Sabrina had said that she was a Psychic, but Lorelei wasn't sure if she believed the Kantan or not.

Still, sometimes the Kantan's intuition was uncanny. She knew things that she normally shouldn't have been able to, been able to reach things she shouldn't have been able to, and convince a person to do something they normally wouldn't have. Maybe it was just because Sabrina was more beautiful than her, according to her guy friends.

Maybe. But Lorelei didn't really care. Well, if she was going to move to Kanto, she had better get all the information she could. Sabrina would probably have something that she could use to get out of Kanto as soon as she got Sneasel's kid. Then she would leave Kanto, and never look back.

That poet—what was her name—had done it, so why shouldn't she be able to? All she'd had when she left Alto the first time was an Entrophen, and she became one of Alto's most famous heroes and poets. Devon Harding. That was it. She'd have to do research at school on Devon, and then from then on pattern herself after her.

"Lorelei?" a voice cut through her thoughts. Almost literally. "Lorelei!" she felt someone shaking her right arm, and she looked over to see Sabrina staring at her in concern. "Are you okay? I was asking you about the press conferences you've got today, but you were in a world all your own."

Lorelei shook her head to focus herself, and replied, "Yeah, just a bit distracted. Sorry." She looked past the Kantan to the window, and watched the countryside flying past. This was one of the last times she'd see it, she realized, "I'm-" she paused, not quite sure what to say, "I guess I can't wait until they're over. Especially the one with the school."

Sabrina smiled, and somehow something deep inside of Lorelei made her want to smile along with her, "Well," she said, "Don't worry about it too much. The more you worry, the greater the chance that subconsciously you'll mess something up."

Lorelei sighed and leaned her head against the headrest, trying to ignore the drone of the rest of the bus, "Great," she muttered, "Just great."

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The rest of the day was a blur, full of teachers and students alike congratulating her. Lorelei wished that they would just stop. She'd won a National Tournament, so what? Any of them could have, if they had put their mind to it and trained as hard as they could. They hadn't, but she had. It was that simple. Now, they were making a big deal about nothing.

She sighed and walked to the podium Vice-Principal Giovanni had set up in the main auditorium. The Vice-Principal had tried to be nice, but it was something Lorelei had dreaded since the moment she had won the tournament.

She swallowed hard and stepped to the podium. Immediately, three hundred of her schoolmates were on their feet, yelling questions at her at the top of their lungs. Among them, of course, was Ross Richter, that same grin he'd had the first year, getting ready to ask the same question he had asked that year and every year since.

She inwardly grimaced, and pointed at him, and spoke his name aloud. Might as well get this over with. "You know," he said, grinning from ear to ear, "You're going to have more boyfriends than the rest of us combined. Because, you know, that's the best thing about being famous!"

Lorelei grinned back. She had finally thought of a witty remark to his comments. It had taken her four years, but it would be worth it to see the most popular kid in school being embarrassed like he would be. "You're saying," she replied loudly, "That all of you want boyfriends?"

There was a moment of silence, then laughter, catcalls, and booing could be heard. Most of it directed at Richter, who sat down quickly, his cheeks burning. Now that that was out of the way, she could enjoy the rest of the press conference. She pointed at the head cheerleader, Elizabeth Tenloss, or Beth to her friends. Which, of course, her being a celebrity, she was. But why someone named after a gun could be popular was beyond Lorelei.

Beth stood up, and smiled, showing off twin rows of perfect white teeth, "When," she asked, and Lorelei instantly knew what the question would entail, "Are you going to ask out Jeremiah Ortez?" she demanded, referring to a popular actor who starred in a series, funded by a small company known as Devon Corporation—Altan-based, named after the person Lorelei would try to emulate—portrayal of life on a Journey. Even though it was still in its first season, it had gathered a large fan base, and would probably rake in millions.

Lorelei sighed, and shook her head, "Look," she said, "if I've told you once, I've told you a hundred and twenty-seven times!" actually, that was the number. She'd kept track, "I'm not going to ask Ortez out. Yes, I know you would if you were in my shoes, but I am happily single, and plan to remain that way!" unless, of course, Devon hadn't been single. Then she'd have to find somebody to be her boyfriend. She'd have to check on that.

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Lorelei sat in the library, biographies of Devon Harding surrounding her, interspersed with histories of Devon's time period. Some of the histories she'd discarded, as they referred only to Hoenni, Nuschantian, Effeulan, Sintaurian, or other country's history.

She had also discarded the dozen books of poetry that Harding had written, most of which were love poems, Lorelei had discovered, to her extreme distaste. Apparently, Devon had been hopelessly in love with the Tintian Gerahid for most of her life. The research she had done indicated that they had barely been together for, at most, a few months during their entire lifetime. But there was that time when both had been missing…

From what Lorelei had been able to gather, Devon had had purple hair, and she was tempted to dye her hair, except she knew that her mother would be horrified and chop everything off.

So that was a no-go. Apparently, Devon had also had an Entrophen, but Lorelei couldn't find any mention of what age it was. She'd have to catch another one before she left, so her parents would have no excuse but to let her bring it. Apparently Devon had specialized in Poison types, as she had also had a Blounter, a Venasaur, a Gengar, a Menill, and several other Pokémon.

Lorelei raised her head, and frowned. She could certainly catch a Menill before she left Alto, and possibly a Blounter as well, but she wasn't sure if she wanted to. Menill were part Psychic type, yes, but they were protectors of the Altan's Shrine to Allnian, and she didn't really feel like it was right to take one away from their duty.

Then there were Blounters. They were odd creatures. Apparently they were more common back in Devon's day, but she was certain that she could find one. They were huge, after all, sluggish, and ate a lot. They were Grass types, though, and Grass types were just too common for them to merit a place on her team.

Lorelei sighed and rubbed her eyes. How long had she been at this? She glanced at her chronometer. Two hours? Had it really been that long? She shook her head, and lowered her eyes to the books again, then suddenly realized something. The OTHER Press Conference. The real one! It was about to start! And she wasn't there yet. Lorelei groaned, leaped to her feet, grabbed her backpack, and ran.

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Lorelei breathed hard, staring into the sea of reporters. There were definitely more than fifty here, and that would have made her nervous, if she hadn't had had years of experience. She had ran as fast as she could, but she hadn't been able to make it for the beginning of the press conference, but, fortunately, had made it just as they were announcing that she was late.

"Miss Winters!" the reporter she had indicated several seconds before asked as the other reporters sat down on the edge of their seats, ready to leap up again the second she finished her answer to this reporter's question, "Roger Clydesdale, Johto News Network. How do you feel about the rumors of a Pokémon division being added to the next Allnian National Tournament?"

There was dead silence in the room. No one knew what to say. Lorelei's eyes widened, and turned around to face the ANT officials behind her. They shrugged, and Lorelei swallowed, "This is the first I've heard, but personally, I'm horrified that such a long-standing tradition of personal talent, endurance, and skill would be marred by throwing Pokémon into the mix."

There was a slight pause as the reporters waited to be sure she was done, then they leaped to their feet. Lorelei squinted into the crowd, and spotted a familiar emblem. The top of a Pokéball—white, of course—with the control, on a red background. She frowned, and pointed at the man. "You," she said, "With the Indigo Battle Network."

The man grinned as the other reporters around him sat down slowly. "Eusine Fratine," he said, "The Indigo Battle Network has recently heard rumors that your father, Archibald Winters, is stepping down as chairman of Silph Company in Alto, and that he is being transferred to Kanto. My question is twofold. One, do these rumors have any precedence in fact and, two, if you do move to Kanto, do you plan on becoming a Pokémon trainer?"

Once again, the silence was absolute. Lorelei stood, stunned, knowing that whatever she said next would be discussed on news networks all over the world. She was, after all, one of the most famous people on the planet at that moment. Her moving to Kanto and becoming a trainer after a short career as a fighter who fought without Pokémon, would be a phenomenal shift.

She paused, thinking for a moment. Should she really answer the question? After all, her personal life, as she'd told reporters multiple times, was none of their business. However, she had a sneaking suspicion that her parents wouldn't want her to answer. That was what made her answer. Despite her being semi-congenial to her parents over the last ten hours, she was still mad at them, and would be for quite some time.

"Yes," she said, grinning as she thought about how mad her parents would be when they found out that she had leaked news of their move. Well, good for them. Now they'd know how they made her feel. "We're moving to Kanto. I think I heard my parents say Viridian City."

She paused for effect, mentally laughing as she heard a river of murmurs abruptly running through the press seated in front of her, and some of the men and women in the back reaching for their cell phones and hurrying out the back doors, all wanting to be the first with the news that she, Lorelei Belle Winters, was moving to Kanto.

"I would like to participate in the Indigo League," she said slowly, an idea forming in her mind even as she was speaking, "But I'm not sure that my parents will let me." There. That ought to be enough to stir up a few of her most devoted fans into writing her mother and telling her to let Lorelei join the Indigo League. "Any more questions?" she asked.

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"How could you?" Lorelei stared up at her mother, who had been trying her best to hold her temper while still lecturing Lorelei immediately upon her return from the press conference. "We had agreed, I thought, not to let anyone know about our move until your father announced it himself." She conveniently ignored, Lorelei realized smugly, the part of the press conference where Lorelei had stated that her mother wouldn't let her participate in the Indigo League. That meant that her assumption had been correct.

"They asked me a question," Lorelei said, grinning, "I had to answer them. I had a press conference to run, after all!"

Her mother glared at her, "Just because they asked a question doesn't mean that you have to answer it. You know that. You've known that since the first time you were in a press conference. Even before that. When you watched some of your father's press conferences."

Lorelei narrowed her eyes, "Will you let me have a Pokémon Journey in Kanto?" she asked, point blank, wanting an immediate answer.

Her mother shook her head and sighed, "You've shown that you obviously can't handle responsibility, so no. As of this moment, you are forbidden from starting a Pokémon Journey of any kind until you begin to show some responsibility."

Lorelei's eyes narrowed, and the two glared at each other. She had won the first battle, but her mother had responded quickly and won the second. Only time would tell who would win the war.


	4. On my Own

I'd like to thank Gaby B for the only review of the last chapter.

Well, here it is. the last Chapter that took up what WAS Chapter 1. After this, we're going on to a new Chapter.

And remember...

This is only the beginning. You cannot possibly begin to imagine the horrors, the wonders, and the battles that lie ahead.

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So, this was it. It had finally begun. She was never really convinced that it would come, but it had. Here she was, on the very outskirts of Viridian City. Behind her, the trees of Viridian Forest reached out as if to embrace her. She looked at the flora of her first obstacle, trying to imagine what the forest, like her future, held.

Sounds emanated from the forest, the cries of the hunters and the hunted. The cries of Pokémon battles. Somewhere, far away, she could hear the excited cries of a trainer's first battle. How the battle would end up, she didn't really care, but it was still a comforting reminder that she wasn't the only one starting her journey on that day. Of course, she was probably among the oldest that would set forth that year, but that, of course, wasn't the point.

What was the point, however, was that she would have a journey that no one would ever forget, she knew. She wasn't sure how she knew it, but somehow she had a feeling that her journey would be one for the history books, and wouldn't be forgotten in quite some time. There was something that she couldn't quite put her finger on about setting off.

She looked back at Viridian City, at its green buildings and large parks, and wondered if she was really doing the right thing. Would it have been better if she had stayed in Viridian, where she was at least safe? What would happen to her once she set out? She shook her head. There was no going back, she knew that. With a small smile, she remembered how she had gotten where she was in the first place.

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The day had finally come. She'd been dreading it for days, and had been doing everything she could to hamper its arrival, and, failing that, prevent her family from finally shipping her off to Kanto. But now, it had come, and the last of the boxes were in the foyer, in front of the door, waiting for the last moving truck to come and take them away.

Lorelei sat, stunned, on a bench near the door, her loyal team of Pokémon sitting all around her. How could she depart from them, after giving them most of the last four years? She sighed, and slipped off of the bench, her team following solemnly behind her. She walked over to a mirror, and looked at herself. Her usually ornate jet-black hair was a mess, she observed with apathy, and her clothes were wrinkled from having been slept in. She sighed and decided to take one last walk around her house before she had to leave it forever.

Her cerulean eyes took in her surroundings with something that, if she had been a soldier, would have been something akin to shellshock. The paintings on the wall, the plush carpeting, the laboratories where she would sit and watch Professor Silph work for hours, the Pokémon Center where Nurse Joy used to teach her about Pokémon—ethics, general information, and battling strategies—for hours on end…she was going to leave it all behind.

It still hadn't fully sunk in yet.

Lorelei made her way out to the garden, and sank down next to a patch of flowers, and stared at them, but didn't really see them. She heard her team lying, sitting, and hovering around her, and something in her felt like punching something. They were so loyal, and here she might never see them again. It just didn't seem right, having invested so much time into them, and not being able to take them with her. It almost felt like betrayal.

She felt something crawling into her lap and curling up, and she looked down to see Sneasel lying there in a ball, eyes wide open, staring up at her. It nearly broke her heart. Sneasel was about to be a father, in just another month, and she wouldn't be around to see his newborns.

She still remembered the first time that she had seen him. He had been so cute, scratching at Berries on a bush. She had forgotten what kind of berries it had been, by now, but she still remembered how the Sneasel had spotted her, and spun around, executing a flip, and landing in a defense position. It had been then that she knew that she had to have him.

The battle that had ensued had been nothing short of frantic, due to the fact that Lorelei had "borrowed" a Gloom from her brother. She had made good use of the powders, however, and had managed to capture Sneasel. After, however, Brandon's Gloom had fainted. When he had discovered what she had done with his Pokemon, he had been furious, and had threatened to release Sneasel back into the wild, but relented only after Lorelei promised him that she would never do anything like that again.

Of course, that promise only lasted thirty-six hours, when she first met Duskull, but that wasn't the point.

She sensed, somehow, rather than heard or saw Duskull floating in behind her, as if summoned by her train of thought. When she had asked Professor Silph about the Ghost-type's seemingly Psychic abilities, he had told her that Duskull were empathic, and that was how they caught their prey. When she had asked him what the word "empathic" meant, Silph had grinned and explained that empathy was a name for an ability to tell what others are thinking. He had further explained that while humans were empathic, it was because of reading body language or speech patterns, not any kind of Psychic ability. Psychic empathy, he had said, allowed a Pokémon who had the ability to know where exactly every living thing, except Dark types, were in the immediate vicinity. Also, he had informed her, his face split by an excited grin, it appeared that some empathic Pokémon could actually change the mood of another non-dark type Pokémon, without affecting any of the Pokémon's other brainwave patterns.

Professor Silph's explanation had made her look at her second Pokemon much differently after that, as well as her fourth, Haunter, when he had told her that most, if not all Ghost types were empathic, at least to some degree. It made sense that Duskull was empathic, too. She was always the mediator when any conflict among her team, or between Lorelei and one of her team arose, and, more often than not, the arguments were settled without a fight.

Lorelei sighed, and shifted slightly, freeing up her right leg, which had fallen asleep. The movement awakened Sneasel, who glared up at her for a second, before readjusting himself and drifting back off.

She glanced around, and spotted Graveller sunning himself on a rock ledge overlooking the garden. At first she thought he was asleep, but then she noticed that he was looking at her. That was typical for him. He constantly laid around, but he was always ready to come to her aid if she needed it. Right now, he stuck to the high ground because, if anyone he needed to attack came, he could use his Rock Throw or Rock Slide techniques to fend off her attackers, then leap down and impose himself between Lorelei and whoever was attacking her.

He was always thinking in terms of combat, and that was probably why he was her number one battling Pokémon, with Sneasel a close second. He had, from what Micheal Carentamous, Silph's aide, had told her, vowed something of a life debt to her because she had rescued him from an incredibly fast incoming tide on Alto's coast. This was, he had told probably the most committed to her of any of her team. Since Carentamous had studied Pokémon behavior for most of his thirty-five year life, she was pretty sure that he had it right.

Haunter wasn't with her, of course. He was probably still in her special place, hovering in the exact place where he always was. If she went there, he'd try to comfort her, he was sure, but it wasn't likely that he was going to move from his pseudo-assigned spot. He would probably resist trying to go to Kanto, even if she was able to bring him.

Lorelei stared at the plants in front of her. It was odd, seeing them there. They were called terrestrial anemone. It was a distant relative of the aquatic anemone, but had been specially bred and genetically altered to increase the strength of its cellulose, and allowed it to support its own weight outside of water. The entire process had taken several hundred years, and many millions of dollars, much of which came from Team Magma—their leaders had said that they wanted to take something from the oceans to spite Team Aqua—and Team Flora—who supported any research to plants, as long as they were not put to use as weapons—and had been performed by Silph Company. Lorelei had come to enjoy the plants, and had spent many a waking hour tending to them. And now she would leave them and her team here in Alto.

At least her parents were allowing her to bring Entrophen to Kanto. True, Entrophen wouldn't actually be hers anymore, he would belong to her parents, but at least he'd come with her. Of course, that was because he would die nearly five months after their arrival in Kanto of old age. Unless, of course, he evolved into an Attrophen, which happened very rarely, before he died.. In fact, it hadn't been recorded in more than three hundred years, and no one really knew what they were like or looked like, and most Pokémon Professors thought that it was a genetic ability.

She'd gone to the Kantan embassy several times, begging them to let her bring her team to Kanto. He'd apologized to her, and told her that the Indigo League did not recognize Pokémon caught before the age of ten. That had made Lorelei storm out of the embassy, enraged at the fact that she would turn ten six months after moving to Kanto. Then she had come back, asking if she could bring her team to Kanto. The ambassador's aide responded that bringing wild Pokémon into the country was not allowed, and, because her Pokémon were caught before the age of ten, they would be considered wild Pokémon.

From the house, she heard her mother calling her, saying that everything was loaded, and that it was time to get in the car. Lorelei thought one more time about trying to run away or try to escape somehow so she wouldn't have to go to Kanto. She'd gone over a thousand escape plans, but each plan had some major flaw, that would void the entire thing. She'd tried running away from home a half dozen times, but each time the Alt-Sec, or Altan Security Forces, found her within two and a half hours. It seemed as if there was nothing she could do to escape.

Lorelei sighed. Who was she kidding? She was going to Kanto, and there was nothing she could do to stop it. She got up slowly, bidding goodbye to her beloved Pokémon, and went into the house. There was no doubt about it.

It was time to face the future.

And then she'd beat the living daylights out of it for what it had done to her.

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"Huh? What was that?" Lorelei asked, putting down her book, and looking up at the woman her family had hired to be a flight attendant on their way to Viridian City. She remembered her father saying something about the woman—her name was Delia, wasn't it—going to Kanto to meet her husband, after studying at the Altan Botanical University.

"I asked," the woman repeated, smiling gently, "Would you like any more pop or something to eat? There's still a good hour left before we begin our descent."

"Maybe a Grape Spritz?" Lorelei asked, "I don't really want to stop reading this if I can help it," she said, lifting up the **Indigo League Rules and Regulations, Twelfth Edition** to show Delia what she was reading, "I want to get started in the Indigo League as quickly as I can."

Delia smiled, "Of course," she said, and set a can of the beverage onto Lorelei's tray table, and moved on.

Lorelei was barely aware of this, however, as she was once again firmly ensconced in the Indigo League regulations concerning the capture, release, and other ways of receiving or losing Pokémon.

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Lorelei put her hands on her hips and surveyed Pallet Town. It wasn't much of a town, really. The airstrip was only sufficient for small planes, one of which they had transferred to in Saffron City, because her father had wanted to meet Kanto's main Pokemon Prof. There wasn't much going for Pallet Town besides the Professor's laboratory. If it weren't there, the town's population would probably dwindle to close to nothing within a year. Yes, it was the main jumping-off point for the Indigo League, but it also appeared to be one of the smallest towns in the entire country. It was quaint, with the buildings painted nearly every color of the rainbow, but Lorelei was sure that she wouldn't come back to the town for a long time.

It was in sharp contrast to Saffron City, the capital of Kanto, and the home to two gyms. The Primary Gym, the Fighting Dojo, had been the gym for the last dozen or so years, Lorelei had learned from her readings about Kanto, and the second gym, led by a young woman named Agatha Fraley, was a relative newcomer, but was quickly gaining power. Most people projected that Agatha would defeat the gym trainers and leaders in the Fighting Dojo in short order, and would become the primary gym of Saffron City.

Lorelei brought herself back to the present, and hurried after her father, who was striding purposefully towards Professor Samuel B.F. Oak's Pokémon Research Lab. She knew that much of the funding for his research came from Silph Company, and that her father would most likely have him over for dinner many times. It wouldn't hurt to make a good first impression.

The scene that greeted her as she entered the laboratory surprised her. Where Silph's laboratory had been a calm, serene place, Oak's laboratory could best be described as barely organized chaos. Screaming, running around, and frantic scribbling were commonplace, and then there were the kids. Lorelei assumed that they were there to get a Pokémon from Professor Oak, as was his wont once a month. The realization that she had walked in on it cut her deeply, as she remembered her mother forbidding her to start a journey.

Her father was barely two steps of her, trying to squeeze forward through the knot of kids. It looked like he wasn't making much progress. Lorelei shook her head and glanced down at Entrophen, who was looking up at her, a pleading expression on his face. It was then that she remembered that Entrophen had hearing that was among the most acute of any Pokemon. This racket, while loud for her, must be torturous for him. She smiled sympathetically and nodded; the saber-toothed tiger immediately opened his maw and let loose a roar that cut sharply above, and then through all the noise in the laboratory.

Lorelei leaned against the doorjamb, studying the stunned expressions on the faces of the children mixed with those of awe, the terrified expressions on the few parents—besides her father, of course—in the room, and the unremitting interest from thescientists.

Professor Oak himself threaded his way through the crowd and came up to her and her father, and held out his hand, an animated expression splashed across his face. "Archibald!" he exclaimed, "It's been a long time! When I heard that you were coming to Kanto, I never thought I'd meet you so soon!" he turned to the children, who were staring at him accusingly, and gestured towards one of his aides, "Jeffrey will give you your Pokemon, I need to speak with this man." He said dismissively, and turned back to Lorelei's father, but caught sight of Lorelei and her Pokemon behind him.

"Is that..." he asked incredulously, trailing off. "An Entrophen," he said softly, his face one of excitement, like a schoolboy having just gotten a new infatuation, "My, I've never seen one before." He raised his eyes to Lorelei, "Are you it's trainer?" he asked.

Lorelei's eyes darkened, and she twisted her lip. "I used to be," she said, glancing at her father, "But then we moved here."

Professor Oak's eyes glittered. "I've never seen one before. You'd let me study him, won't you?" he asked, never taking his eyes off the Altan Pokemon, and ignoring the pandemonium and the cries of the aide he had referred to as Jeffrey for help, "It's a tremendous opportunity. How old is he?"

"Four and a half," Lorelei replied, her eyes dropping to the ground.

Professor Oak grimaced, "Maybe," he said, "I should just talk to your father, and we can discuss your Entrophen later."

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Lorelei stared at the orb that sat in front of her on her desk in her room. It was a Pokeball. Her parents didn't know about it yet, and, with any luck, they wouldn't find out about it. It had been seven years since she had moved to Kanto, and she'd missed three of Sneasel's litters, two of Duskull and Haunter's, and an additional four of Geodude's litters.

Yes, Viridian City was all well and good, but it was just too confining. She was used to a big city. She'd lived in the capital of Alto until she was ten, after all! Now she'd been dropped into a town that was a paltry fraction of what Smogh had been, and she was expected to cope? Sure, she had done all right when she was younger, but as she had gotten older, the city had chafed more and more on her. It hadn't helped that Entrophen had died relatively soon after she arrived in Viridian City, three months sooner than expected. After that, the city had become synonymous with her pain of losing the Pokémon, and she grew to hate it with every fiber of her being.

She knew that she'd gotten bitter, and she'd become obsessed with beating everyone and everything around her. She'd gotten into more than her share of fights and trouble, but she didn't really care. Now she'd figured out how to bet her parents. She'd had her brother secretly send her a Sneasel from her first Pokemon's latest litter, and he'd sent her a prototype Pokedex to test out as well Using it, she'd been able to hack into the Indigo League's mainframe, and insert herself into the trainer list. She'd made sure, when she hacked into the Indigo Mainframe, to leave a trail that would stand close scrutiny that said that she had first registered in Johto, and hacked into the Johto League Mainframe to back it up. Because of that, once she was in Johto, she would be able to travel without worrying about being returned to Kanto. From the stash of money that she'd hidden away, she'd bought a travel backpack, several Pokeballs, and healing supplies from the local Pokémon Mart. She had put everything in a lockbox under her bed, and had waited for the right opening, so she could slip away, and have several day's head start before her parents knew she was gone. At least in Kanto, there wasn't a Psychic net, so running away from home was much, much easier.

After all, once she was reported missing, she'd be running from Indigo League authorities, and every Gym Leader in the country would be required to turn her in, or have their Pokemon Training licenses removed. That meant that if she wanted an Indigo League Badge, she'd have to move quickly.

By her estimation, it would take her nearly a day to get to Pewter City through Viridian Forest, and, once there, she'd have to make a run for the Johto Border to prevent being picked up and being returned to home, and have everything confiscated. She had everything planned, and the only Polleen in the ointment was if she ran across a Kanto trainer or Kantan Officer Jenny while she was making her break for the border. If all went well, she'd have made it to Blackthorne City before anyone knew that she had run away, and from there, it would be a quick run down to New Bark Town.

She'd gotten the Sneasel several weeks before, and had been training it in secret ever since, preparing it for Luther Slate, the Pewter City Gym Leader. She was confident that she would be able to beat him. She knew that she'd only have one shot at the Pewter City Gym Badge, or she wouldn't be able to make it to the Johto Border in time.

She heard the door slam on the floor below, and quickly swept the Pokeball into the lockbox, shut the lid, and spun the combination opener to scramble the combination. She had barely managed to get it shoved under her bed and get on top of it, reading what she had been assigned to her in school before the door opened, and her mother poked her head in. "Any calls?" she asked, and Lorelei grunted and shook her head.

The door closed, and Lorelei sighed in relief as she lowered her schoolbook. That had been close. Just three more days, and she'd be able to get out of Viridian City. Her parents were leaving for Celadon City for a week-long conference on the pros and cons of genetic splicing on Pokémon. There were teams of scientists arguing both for and against it. Those that were in favor of the genetic splicing were from a company known as the Rocket Group, a subsidy of Specter Corporation, and those opposed were mainly from the newcomer company Devon Corporation. Her parents had been called in to moderate the debate.

She'd only have, however, a two-day window in which to go. Her next-door neighbor, Mr. Peterson, who was of the opinion that Clefairy and Clefable came down in space ships from the moon wanted to capture him and perform experiments on him, was going to be checking on her every day, but would be gone for the first two days of the conference. By her estimation, it would take a day to get to Pewter, she would rest up there, challenge the gym leader, and head for the Johto Border. It would take up the rest of that day to get there. It would be close. Very, very close.

Lorelei grinned, and glanced at the newspaper she had brought up to her room. On the front, it showed Professor Elm standing in front of his lab, a curious-looking creature standing by his feet. The headline proclaimed, "Johto Scientist genetically mixes Arcanine and Ninetails DNA." What he had gotten, Lorelei had read in the article, was a litter of baby Pokemon that he had dubbed "Vulithe." It had also said that in nine days, he would be giving six of them away to trainers for observation. The trainers would only have them for one week, but Elm wanted to know how the Vulithe acted outside of the laboratory.

Lorelei glanced at her watch, and rolled off her bed onto her feet, and walked down the stairs. If she was going to be going off on her own, she had better study as much as she could about Pokemon, so she would be as ready as possible. She grabbed her backpack from where she had lain it down by the door and said, "I'm going to the library. School report," and walked out without waiting for her mother to reply. Only a few more days, and she wouldn't have to stay in Viridian City anymore.

Less than twelve hours, now, and then she'd be able to go on a journey of a lifetime. Just a little longer. She had her supplies, she had her Pokemon, she had her Pokedex, and now there was just one thing that she needed to get. New clothes.

Lorelei stared at herself in the mirror, and grinned. She'd cut her long hair, and now there was very little of it at all. She had cut her hair so that her black hair, of which there was the most, was short, and her short, blond streak was long, and draped forward over her shoulder. She had just finished picking out clothes for her journey, and was very satisfied. She had picked out a leather jacket, sunglasses, several pairs of jeans, and several T-shirts from Johto baseball teams. The Electabuzz, Jynx, Sneasels, and the Charizards were just a few of the shirts that she had gotten.

She grinned, and headed for the checkout counter. Her parents were gone, so now she didn't have to sneak around. She only had one more stop after this. The Grocery Store. She'd need to buy enough food to last for at least a week, to make sure she'd have enough food to make it to Cherrygrove City. She grinned, and was almost trembling with excitement. She was almost on her way. She had only a few hours to wait, and then she'd be on the run.

True, she wouldn't really be on the run for nearly a full day, but she'd have to make every second count.

Lorelei glanced at herself in her new clothes in the mirror and grinned. She looked back down at the lockbox in front of her, and opened it. Inside were all the supplies she had gathered, and enough money to last for at least a month. She grinned as she began stuffing the money, then the supplies into her backpack, and strapped on her customized Pokéball belt. In addition to the magnetic clamps that kept Pokéballs on the belt, she had had it outfitted with several more pouches that were just big enough to fit Potions, Antidotes, and other healing supplies into, as well as a special pouch for berries, and another for miscellaneous objects. That was where she put her empty Pokéballs now, as well as some extra spending money. Her eyes glittered as she picked up the Pokéball containing her first Indigo League-recognized Pokémon, and put the Pokéball onto her belt.

It occurred to her as she grabbed the backpack and heaved it up over her shoulders that she could just go to New Bark Town right away, and skip Pewter City altogether, but that would negate the thrill of being out on her own for the first time. And the thrill that came when she knew she was being chased.

She grinned, and hurried out the door. Under cover of darkness, she knew, there were few who could keep up with her. She had spent entire days exploring the area between Viridian City and Pewter City with a trainer that had wanted to train. So familiar had she become with the route, in fact, she'd become a guide, and had made a lot of money guiding trainers back and forth between the two towns, and guiding them to nests of rare Pokemon. She also had the added bonus of watching trainers battle, and she had learned much because of it.

She knew where to walk, where to go, and what to avoid. And that was if she didn't have a Pokemon. With a Pokemon, she knew, there was nobody that could catch her. She would be, however, in unexplored territory once she traveled a mile west from Pewter.

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For one short moment, she stopped to take in Viridian City, and then she turned, and dashed into the woods. She had a tight schedule, and she needed to get moving if she wanted to keep it.

Lorelei slowed to a stop at one of the creeks that she had designated as a rest area, and sat down on the ground to try to catch her breath. She had made good time, but it would count for nothing if she didn't keep up the pace.

Suddenly, she heard a twig snap behind her. She leaped to her feet and whirled around, her hand snapping out and releasing Sneasel before she dropped down into a defensive position.

"Who's there?" she demanded, taking a cautious step forward.

A figure formed out of the bushes and came towards her, grinning. Lorelei felt her eyes narrow. It was a human, not a Pokemon. Nobody else knew about places like this. Or, if they did, they didn't know how to get here. They were too heavily guarded by Pokemon. That meant only one thing. She'd been discovered earlier than she had thought, and they were here to take her back. Well, they wouldn't get her without a fight, that was for certain. With a yell, she charged forward, felt something cold go up her arm, and somehow found herself on her back, staring up at that grinning face.

Lorelei felt true terror as she realized that she couldn't move. Not a muscle would work. She opened her mouth to scream, but no words came out. Then the human dissolved into the grinning face of a Gastly. Lorelei felt herself grow colder and colder as the Ghost descended towards her. This was it. She was dead. And there was nothing she could do about it.

To be continued….

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Well, enjoy people. It only gets better from here.

Read and Review, please. And remember...there's going to be battles later on. BATTLES. As in World War II. As in thousands of men.


	5. On the Road Again

Farla, Gaby Y, and Redemmo, thanks for the reviews.

Farla, my friend Topaz, author of On the Wings of Council, has spoken highly of the review you've given you. thanks for your advice. I'm sure that next time I rewrite this, I'll use 'em. Oh, for those of you who see Lorelei running away, not being kicked out, that was the extended (this) version, and she said in an e-mail that she didn't read it.

Gaby Y: Thanks for being a faithful reviewer! And as for your questions: yes and yes. That Eusine Fratine back there IS Eusine the Suicuine Hunter, too. Wait, did I say that already?

Redemmo: Thanks. That had been about all I was going to do of Bruno, but in honor of your excellent fic, I'll add him in later.

Before you say anything, in my Pokemon universe, the Gastly universe can learn Transform, all right?

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Previously on Hell Hath No Fury: An Ice Queen's Saga

The door closed, and Lorelei sighed in relief as she lowered her schoolbook. That had been close. Just three more days, and she'd be able to get out of Viridian City.

She'd only have, however, a two-day window in which to go. Her next-door neighbor, was going to be checking on her every day, but would be gone for the first two days of the conference. By her estimation, it would take a day to get to Pewter, she would rest up there, challenge the gym leader, and head for the Johto Border. It would take up the rest of that day to get there

Lorelei heard a twig snap behind her. She leaped to her feet and whirled around, her hand snapping out and releasing Sneasel before she dropped down into a defensive position.

"Who's there?" she demanded, taking a cautious step forward.

A figure formed out of the bushes and came towards her, grinning. Lorelei felt her eyes narrow. It was a human, not a Pokemon. Nobody else knew about places like this. Or, if they did, they didn't know how to get here. They were too heavily guarded by Pokemon. That meant only one thing. She'd been discovered earlier than she had thought, and they were here to take her back. Well, they wouldn't get her without a fight, that was for certain. With a yell, she charged forward, felt something cold go up her arm, and somehow found herself on her back, staring up at that grinning face.

Lorelei felt true terror as she realized that she couldn't move. Not a muscle would work. She opened her mouth to scream, but no words came out. Then the human dissolved into the grinning face of a Gastly. Lorelei felt herself grow colder and colder as the Ghost descended towards her. This was it. She was dead. And there was nothing she could do about it.

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Lorelei stared up at the Gastly that slowly descended upon her. It was little more than a large, spectral blob with a face on it. A large, spectral blob with a face on it that was going to kill her.

Lorelei grimaced. This was just great. Nobody knew where she was, so no help would be forthcoming. Plus, even if she did get out of this, she'd be hours behind schedule. It occurred to her that she could give up now, and forget all about going to Johto. Or about living, for that matter, or she could fight the Gastly with every fiber in her being.

A quick check of her senses revealed that she couldn't move anything. Then, with sheer force of will, she slowly lifted an arm, and pushed herself to her right. The Gastly seemed to frown, then darted down and, with its long tongue, licked her arm. Instantly, Lorelei could feel numbness lancing out from the location of the lick, and remembered that she had learned from Professor Oak that Pokemon that used the Lick technique actually utilized a variant of several kinds of poison that was absorbed through the skin, and passed through the bloodstream. Some moved through the bloodstream faster than others.

This was, of course, different than the various powder-based poisons, paralyzing agents, and sleeping agents. Those, if she recalled correctly, were inhaled through the respiratory tract, and then absorbed into the bloodstream.

She groaned. Sometimes, ignorance was better than knowing exactly how things happened in battles. Because if you were ignorant of how things worked, you wouldn't be able to imagine it happening. Slowly. Painfully. Cell by agonizing cell.

The Gastly hovered several feet away, watching her amusedly. It stared at her, licking whatever it had for lips, and then moved forward in short, agonizingly taunting jaunts. Then, it rose up, moved back slightly, then came about smartly. It hovered in the air, grinning at her wickedly, and then came in, slowly, for the kill.

Then, out of nowhere, an Ice Beam stabbed through its innards, and passed through the other side, freezing a good deal of whatever kind of gases made up the Gastly, but not enough to freeze it completely.

Growling softly, the Gastly stopped its forward motion, pivoted along its horizontal axis, and, through its spectral innards, Lorelei could see the tell-tale glow of the Gastly's eyes as it used its Hypnosis Technique.

Lorelei felt her brain begin to shut down from the Paralyzing Poison, and black began creeping in at the edge of her vision. She wasn't sure if it was supposed to have thiskind of effect, but then, it was usually used on Pokemon, not humans, wasn't it.

She could hear the sounds of a Pokemon battle off to one side, and watched as the Gastly disappeared out of her vision. Whatever Pokemon her savior was, she kenw that it couldn't possibly hold out for long. That gastly was nearly ready for evoltion into a Haunter, if her time with the Pokemon Professors Antonio Silph and Oak had taught her anything at all about such things. She couldn't hear a trainer barking out orders, so Gastly's opponent had to be either wild, or…or the Sneasel she had brought with her to start her on her journey. Her eyes narrowed. If it really was herSneasel, there was no way that she would let anything happen to it.

Her eyes narrowed. How could she get rid of this paralysis? It was far more potent for a human than it was for a Pokemon. She didn't have anything to counter the paralysis poison….or did she? Suddenly, her muddled mind remembered she had PRZ Heals in her backpack. They hadn't been approved for humans, though. On the other hand, however, the paralyzation poison generally wasn't used on humans, either. And the PRZ Heal HAD been specially formulated to counter this and other strains of paralyzation poisons as well.

Lorelei's eyes widened as she realized what she needed to do. She needed to get one of her PRZ Heals, and inject it into her bloodstream. She nearly panicked when she thought of this, but then remembered the healing supplies in her Pokeball Belt.

From what she could hear of the Pokemon Battle, the Pokemon attacking the Gastly was losing. She tried to remember if she had put any PRZ Heals into the leather pouches on the Pokeball Belt that she had modified. With horror, she realized that she couldn't remember anymore if she had put any in there. She narrowed her eyes and realized that she'd need to pump them into herself at random.

That meant taking the risk of them being Potions, SLP Heals, BRN Heals, or FRZ Heals. She took a deep breath, and struggled to open the first leather pouch, and jabbed it against her skin. There was a quick hiss as the liquid inside metabolized itself into her bloodstream. She felt extremely warm in the leg that she had jabbed whatever it was into her system, then it spread throughout her entire body.

Lorelei grimaced as she became warmer and warmer, andshe realized that it must have been a FRZ Heal. Sweating profusely despite the relatively cool temperature, she flipped open the next pouch, and jabbed the container into her thigh. A thin, rushing sensation of coolness pervaded her body, and Lorelei realized, to her abject relief, that she had just given herself a BRN Heal.

Lorelei fumbled with the third pouch, and somehow managed to get whatever it was out and pressed against her leg. Lorelei could feel her control slipping quickly. The blackness that had been pressing against the edges of her vision had now consumed almost all of it. The muzziness that had enveloped her thoughts was now almost overwhelming. With the last vestiges of willpower, she pressed the button that would send whatever it was roaring through her veins.

And then, moments later, she lost consciousness.

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When she awoke again, her first thoughts were that she was dead, and the figure leaning over her was saying that she'd flunked a test, and she wouldn't be passing through the pearly gates anytime soon.

But then, slowly, her vision began to focus. Very slowly. Lorelei groaned and lifted a hand to her forehead. It felt like it weighed thirty tons, but she couldn't care less about it. She had a headache that felt like a Snorlax had sat on her head, every inch of her body ached, and someone had to have a tape recorder and playing feedback. Constantly. Unceasingly. Without end. About how often "The bells" was repeated in the poem "The Bells"

Then she remembered seeing somebody above her. She groaned, and forced her eyes to focus. "Easy," the voice said, "Easy. You're in pretty bad shape, if what I've been able to tell has been right. Did you take all three of those?" the boy asked, pointing at three discarded containers that held the Silph company logo on them.

Lorelei felt herself losing her center of gravity, and reached an arm out to steady herself, but she learned that she still wasn't strong enough to support her own weight, and that the ground wasn't as soft as some people would make it out to be.

"Whoa," the boy said, "Take it easy. You've been through quite the ordeal, what with all the Dream Eaters that Haunter used." Lorelei thought dimly somewhere in the back of her mind that if she were one hundred percent, she'd be excited about a guy being this concerned about her, "And all those Confuse Rays? No wonder you're like this."

Lorelei felt anger slush through her, like it knew where it was going, but somehow couldn't make it. "Where is it?" she demanded weakly, spread-eagled on her back in the middle of Viridian Forest, "I'll kill it."

The boy chuckled. "That'd be pretty hard to do, since it's already a ghost."

Lorelei frowned, and felt herself slipping away from consciousness once more, "That's never stopped me before," she muttered, and fell, into a deep and dreamless sleep.

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Lorelei groaned, and put a hand to her head. For a moment, she wondered if she had loaned her head to some sports team to use at a charity event, and had just now gotten back to her, but then she remembered what had happened Then she remembered. She had to get to Johto!

She sat up quickly, and her head pounded even more—if that were possible. She glanced around, and saw that she was in a plain room. There wasn't much in it, except for the bed. But there was one smell that could never quite be gotten rid of. The tell-tale chemicals of a Pokemon Prof's lab. Lorelei groaned, lifted the covers to make sure she was still dressed, got out of bed, and staggered to the door. Somebody had probably taken her to Pallet Town. It as probably that stupid boy. If she ever got ahold of him—

She opened the door, and gawked openly. On the other side were the usual trappings, machinations, and devices that were frequent to a Pokemon Professor's laboratory, but the thing that set it apart from every other one was the fact that none other than Professor Martin J. Elm was working diligently with his aides. On what, Lorelei didn't know and, frankly, she didn't care that much.

All she wanted to know was how she had gotten from midway between Viridian City and Pewter city in Kanto, across the most dangerous parts of the Viridian Forest, into Johto, and into New Bark Town. Unless Elm was in Pallet Town.

"She's awake!" a familiar voice exclaimed from behind her. She whirled around, though she had to reach out a hand to grab at a nearby table to steady herself, and saw the boy that had been in the forest with her. "Finally. Took you long enough." Lorelei looked at him, a puzzled expression on her face. He grinned, "You were out for a while."

Lorelei felt her heart sink. A while? This would seriously put a damper on her plans. All because of one stupid Gastly. "How—" she began, and stopped when pain seared through her brain, "How long was I out?" she asked weakly.

"Just over a week," the boy said, "I talked to your parents. They said that they didn't give you permission to start your journey, but you were signed up with the Johto League with their signatures. And, since you were technically in Johto by then, they had no legal jurisdiction over you."

Lorelei grimaced, putting the hand not supporting herself up to her forehead. She briefly remembered forging her parents' signature on the registration forms, but what he didn't know wouldn't hurt him. "Huh," she replied. "So I'm, where New Bark Town?" she asked.

The boy grinned, "Nope, Blackthorne. Elm's got a secondary laboratory here, and he's checking up on some of his protégés." The dark-skinned boy glanced past her into the room, "I was on my way here, and I brought you with me. Not as if I could really turn back if I wanted to keep my appointment."

Lorelei frowned, and shook her head to clear a slight buzzing, "Appointment?" she asked, "For what?"

"Ah!" a cheerful voice exclaimed from behind her, "Mr. Slate. How good of you to come. With your input, I've managed to stabilize the DNA." Lorelei turned around to see Professor Elm, his normally immaculate black hair a Rattata's nest. His juvenile-like bright eyes shining with excitement. "We've found a way to stabilize the DNA enough that we think that the next litter of Vulithe will be able to evolve. We've even been able to build a computer simulation of the evolution. We're dubbing it the Artail!"

The dark-skinned boy grinned, although his eyes still remained shut. Did they ever open? "That's great, Professor! I have a feeling that Pyro has been wanting to evolve for a while. I've tried to tell her that it's not possible, but she doesn't seem to listen." Brock grinned, "She's a spunky little thing."

Lorelei, who had been leaning against the wall beside the door, out of Elm's direct eyesight coughed. "Am I invisible?" she demanded, "Or am I just alone, here?"

Elm jumped a good three inches into the air, and spun around, his glasses falling off of his nose, and his eyes darted about wildly, then he spotted her. "Ah," he said, "The mystery girl. Lorelei Belle Winters, four-time champion of the Allnian National Tournament; one of the heirs to the Winters fortune; and the terror of Viridian City, I presume?"

The boy's eyes widened, and for a second Lorelei thought they'd pop right out of his head. Lorelei sighed, "Look, all I did was beat up five kids for picking on me, and they gave me that nickname."

Elm raised an eyebrow. "Yes, except they were all members of Team Rocket, and they all had at least one Pokemon." Lorelei's eyes narrowed at him, but he continued, "And then there were that pair that they sent after you. Jessie and James, wasn't it?" he grinned, "Last I heard, they were going to be getting out of the hospital in a week." He grinned, "I'm sure even Brock here's heard of you."

Lorelei pursed her lips, "Are you done, yet?" she asked, ignoring the open-mouthed kid he'd called Brock, "Because if you are, I'll just take my Sneasel and get out of here."

Elm's eyes lit up, "Ah, yes. Your Sneasel. It's from the Gerantal bloodline, isn't it?" Lorelei raised an eyebrow, "The entire line has a fascinating genomic pattern. Their ice-type moves are unusually strong, even for an Ice type."

Lorelei stared at him, dead-panned, "Are you done?" she asked blankly. "I'd kind of like to get out of here."

Elm nodded, "Why, yes, I think I am. Unless you would like to be one of the next stewards of one of the Vulithes that I've bred. Have you heard of them?"

Lorelei nodded slowly, "It was on the front page of the Viridian City Paper yester-" she caught herself, "about a week ago." She finished.

Elm nodded, "Then you must know that I've been giving them out to trainers for a week at a time. Brock, here, just returned his Vulithe, so we'll have to keep it under observation for at least three days. However, I have a Vulithe down in Pallet Town that I could let you have. For the standard week, of course."

Lorelei raised an eyebrow, "It doesn't bother you that I nearly got killed by a Gastly?" she asked cautiously, knowing that this was a chance of a lifetime, "doesn't it bother you that I might get killed, and it might die with me?"

Johto's Pokemon Professor frowned. "Gastly?" he asked, "Brock told me that it was a Haunter. I wouldn't expect your Sneasel to be able to do anything against something like that. That was probably why it was fainted when he found the two of you."

"Myabe it evolved after it fainted your Sneasel," Brock offered, and the two turned to look at him. "It's just a possibility."

Elm nodded, "that is indeed what appears to have happened.." He turned back to Lorelei, "And no, it doesn't bother me at all. In fact, with your infamy, I'd be honored to have you safeguard one of my special Pokemon. It might just give me a little extra publicity. Brock, you had better run if you want to catch that Breeder's Conference in Azalea Town."

Brock nodded, "Right," he said, "You two will be able to get to New Bark Town without me. I've got to grab a few things in Goldenrod, anyway. I better run." He grinned again, nodded, and darted out the door.

Elm turned to Lorelei, "So," he inquired eagerly, "what do you say, will you take the Vulithe?"

Lorelei shrugged, "Yeah," she said, a faint smile on her face, "Why not? It'll give me something to do."

Elm rubbed his hands together, "Excellent!" he exclaimed, "Then onwards to New Bark Town!"

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Lorelei groaned, "Are we there yet?" she demanded, hurrying to catch up with the surprisingly spry Professor Elm, "I don't see why we had to go out into the woods so you could check on that Sandshrew nest. I'm tired, I'm sore. I'm thirsty. I got scratched up back there when I tried to capture one of them. How much longer?" she demanded.

"It will seem longer," Elm admonished in a frustrated tone, "The more times that you ask how much longer it will be! And I told you not to try to capture them. It's your fault you became injured."

"'It's your fault you became injured,'" Lorelei parroted back, "What does that mean? You should have told me that the Sandslash nest was right next to the Sandshrew nest!"

Elm sighed, "I ASSUMED that you knew that Sandslash was the evolution of Sandshrew, and because Sandshrew are the offspring of Sandslash, you would know that the Sandslash nest would be near the Sandshrew nest!"

Lorelei glared at him, "Yeah," she muttered, "Whatever." She glared at him, and was about to quip another cutting remark when the woods suddenly parted, and they stepped from Route 29 and into New Bark Town.

The view took her breath away. While she was used to big cities, and had become accustomed to small cities, she still wasn't prepared for what she saw.

New Bark Town was little more than a hamlet, with four rows of houses, a small airstrip at the opposite end of town, and several essential buildings such as a Pokemon Center, Fire Department, and Global Police Station formed the perimeter of the small town. The entire town was filled with trees, both young and old, of many different kinds. "it's beautiful," Lorelei breathed.

Elm chuckled, "Yeah, I guess it is. I'm kind of used to it, though, so it doesn't affect me like most people did. It's a better place to live than Goldenrod, though," he remarked, grinning, "Too many people there. Can't get a lot of breathing room. People around here are good, neighborly, and accept you no matter what." Elm smiled contentedly. "Well, come on, now. You said that you wanted a Vulithe, so let's get to the lab and get you set up."

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Lorelei looked around the lab as she entered. It was big. Much larger than the one that Professor Silph had had when she had been living in Alto, yet not quite as big as Oak's had been when they had gone there for his annual Christmas Parties. Still, it was quite spacious. And, if this was as big as it looked from outside, this part was just the public laboratory, and Elm's private lab was in the back. If this was anything like Oak's lab, he probably lived here, too.

Professor Elm deftly made his way through the crush of adults who were all screaming and waving papers at him by smiling and saying something that was drowned out by the screaming to them. Lorelei shook her head. If this was anything like what happened at Oak's place, this was the day before Elm gave out Pokemon.

A sudden chill swept through her as she realized that unless she wanted all the good Pokémon to be scared away by little kids, she would have to get moving as fast as she could. Some of those kids could really move. And they made a lot of noise. In fact, Pokémon from all over the area were probably running away as quickly as they could.

Lorelei tried to look over the crowd, but wasn't quite able to. She'd lost Professor Elm, and with this many people crammed into his lab, all shouting at once, it would be nearly impossible to find him.

Suddenly, Lorelei felt a tap on her shoulder, and saw a parent standing there. "Hi!" she shouted, "Sorry to interrupt whatever you were doing, but my son, Maya recognized you from the old Alnnian Tournaments, and wants to have your autograph!"

Lorelei stood there in shock for a moment, not quite believing that anyone would remember her, then smiled, "Sure!" she shouted, "What do you want me to sign?"

The mother smiled and pushed forward a ten-year old girl. Lorelei forced herself not to grimace. While she probably didn't have sticky fingers anymore, she still didn't like little kids. "Here!" the kid said, thrusting a Pokeball in her face, "This is going to be my starter as soon as Mom finishes registering me!"

Lorelei smiled weakly and took the Pokeball from the kid, as well as a proffered permanent marker, and quickly wrote her name around the white section of the Pokeball. Lorelei handed the Pokeball back to the girl, and smiled quickly before turning back to look for Professor Elm.

Just at that moment, Elm appeared, smiling apologetically, "I'm sorry!" he shouted, "But one of my aides gave the Vulithe to a Hoenner that was passing through. I'll give you Brock's Vulithe. It'll take a few days to get everything in order, though!"

Lorelei smiled, and quickly turned to get away from the lab. As the doors closed behind her, she took a deep breath. Finally, some peace and quiet. Now she'd be able to get started on her journey. With a bounce in her step, she walked towards the Pokemon Center.

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Lorelei smiled and thanked one of the the eternally too-jubilant Nurse Joy sisters, and turned for the door, to be greeted by a sight that would haunt her for four days.

"There she is!" exclaimed the kid whose Pokeball she had signed. Behind her were four kids, young kids, that all looked at her eagerly, wearing what appeared to be those Official Lorelei Fan Club T-shirts she'd managed to get recalled, although not before several hundred of them had been sold in Kanto and, she realized with a sinking stomach, Johto.

Then the moment was over, and the five kids rushed towards her. With a nimble turn and a swift leap, she was over the counter and running through the back door before the Nurse Joy could stop her. She was in a hallway, and there were three doors. One, an exit, was too far away for her to make. The other two were partway down the corridor. One was open, one was closed.

Lorelei ran down the hallway, turned the doorknob on the closed door, booted it open, and darted through the open door. The kids, seeing the newly opened door moving, ran through the door, screaming, and as soon as the last one of them was in, Lorelei darted back out into the hallway, slammed the door closed, and ran through the exit.

THAT had been a close one.

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Lorelei found herself jogging down the path, glancing back over her shoulder at New Bark Town, now several miles distant, and almost convinced herself that she saw little children darting through the shadows.

She shook her head. That was insane. That kid wouldn't be able to officially start until the next day, and by that time, Lorelei would be in Violet City. Lorelei smiled uneasily to herself and turned her attention forwards. Catching the slight movement just in time, she stopped herself abruptly, and a white web shot past by where her head would have been if she hadn't stopped just then.

Lorelei snapped the Pokeball out of its holder, and flicked it into the air. Her Sneasel appeared, and landed in a fighting pose, mirroring the one that its trainer had just dropped into.

From all around her, Lorelei could hear chittering, like some kind of insect. Some kind of big insect. From the woods in front of her, Lorelei saw an Ariados step into the path, and take a challenging step forward. From all sides, Lorelei saw and heard Spinarak climbing onto the path, staring at her with their unblinking eyes.

She growled for a moment. Why couldn't she have a normal journey, where Pokemon were rare, and didn't want you for their next meal every single battle? She took a deep breath, and realized that she herself would have to fight if she wanted to get out of this one. A quick glance around her revealed that there were no fewer than fifteen bugs waiting for her to make the first move, not including the Ariados.

"I'm screwed," she muttered, and smiled tightly as she remembered that her hero, Devon Harding, had died in battle as well. "'course," she chuckled to herself, "That battle wasn't because she was running away from a bunch of kids with a rookie Sneasel." Her Sneasel whipped its head around and bared its tiny teeth at her, while simaltaneously looking confused. "No offense," she laughed. "This is going to be fun. If they don't kill us, first."

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grins

I think that this is my best cliffhanger yet.

And for those of you wondering why I have the numbers, it's because doesn't allow s or +s

:D

MWAHAHAHA!

behold, Lorelei, warrior moron. :D

oh, and if you thought that this story is cool now, you haven't seen anything yet. In Chapter 5, there's destruction on a scale that will shock you, and will send Lorelei off on an adventure unlike anything you've ever (I hope) seen before.


	6. To Take a Lighter to a Spider

Redemmo, Thanks for the review, and for pointing out the mistake. I'll fix that as soon as possible. I look forward to seeing how you do Lorelei in your Bruno fic.

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Lorelei's eyes narrowed as she watched the sixteen arachnid Pokemon scurry into a circle around them. This wasn't good. She was just starting out, and her second battle was against sixteen Pokemon. One of whom was in its most highly evolved state. Lorelei glanced to her right, and spotted a branch that looked sturdy, and decided to make the first move. She crouched and rolled to her right, causing the first volley of Poison Stings and webs miss horribly.

She didn't have time to see if Sneasel had escaped harm, but if he wasn't still functioning, she was screwed. She landed in a crouch near the branch, but was forced to straighten to avoid a strand of Spinarak web. Deftly, she used her foot to launch the dead limb into the air, and she caught it easily.

She spun round, twirling the stick like a baton, coming around to face the Spinarak. Sneasel was doing a good job of keeping them busy, but he could only handle four of them. That left eleven Spinarak for her to handle. Plus the Ariados. Lorelei grinned. This would be fun, unless they killed her.

She crouched, waiting for the next move, and didn't have to wait long. The Ariados launched a flurry of Poisonous barbs towards her, and the rest fired webs at her. She spun away from the attacks, extending the stick experimentally towards the spider-like Pokemon. Immediately, they shifted their aim, but one was faster than the others, and its web quickly engulfed the upper part of the club before Lorelei could duck away.

Lorelei frowned as she retreated further, blocking webs and Poisonous barbs with the stick, and doing her best not to get hit. So far, she'd been doing fine, but it was only a matter of time until she was hit.

Then, suddenly, she had an idea. Most Pokemon were scared of fire. She'd give 'em, fire, all right. She'd give 'em an inferno! She shifted the stick slightly so that most of its weight was in her right hand, and dug with her left in her pocket for her lighter. The Ariados, perceiving weakness, chose that moment to press its attack, and sent dozens of tiny poisonous darts zipping through the air towards her. Fortunately, its aim wasn't very good, and all it succeeded in doing was wrenching the makeshift weapon from Lorelei's grasp, and into the darkness behind her. Lorelei growled, and, giving up on the lighter, slipped her backpack from her shoulders and charged forward, swinging it around her head and shouting at the top of her lungs.

The Spinarak parted before her, and then she was face to face with the Ariados. One quick movement and it was out of the way. From beside her, a web reached out and sent her backpack soaring into the woods. Lorelei almost groaned. This was perfect. Just then, she spotted something glinting in the starlight, and one of Sneasel's Ice Beams. It was her lighter.

She dove for it, making the next round of webs miss, and flicked the cover off and swung towards the spiders, jabbing the lighter forward. It was what would forever stand out in her memory as what saved her life. A spider had gotten perfect aim, and had fired a split second before. It would have sent her flying into the dirt, most of her head covered in spider web, and the battle would have been irrevocably lost. As it was, the spider web barely missed her, and passed directly over the lighter. The web exploded into flames, sending the startled insects scurrying back, and the light showed her the weapon she would use to turn the tide.

She darted forwards, through the Spinarak, ignoring them as they regrouped, and snatched up the club that she had dropped, and lifted her lighter. Immediately, the entire upper half of the club burst into a bright flame.

Suddenly confident, the young woman spun forward, swinging the makeshift sword every which way, blocking poisonous barbs, connecting with webs, thus adding more fuel to the fire, and jabbing.

When next Lorelei looked around, three Spinarak were down, another was retreating, and the remaining seven were staying as far away from her as they could. Then the Ariados strode forward.

Lorelei, for some reason, bowed, and the Ariados mimicked her. Then the battle began in earnest. Lorelei was never quite sure what happened to the Spinarak afterwards, but her battle was uninterrupted, even to its conclusion. It was a terrible battle; one that Lorelei many times thought that she could never win, but she always managed to spot some kind of weakness and exploit it.

What seemed like several hours later, but was most likely only a few minutes, the two paused, and looked at each other. At that moment, her entire focus was on the Ariados alone. Nothing else registered. She would never be able to recount what her Sneasel was doing, or what the Spinarak were doing, but she remembered very vividly every action that the Ariados made.

Then the short pause was over, and the battle was back in full. Lorelei jabbed, and the Ariados slapped her weapon away with one leg, while shoving its other front leg forward towards her. Lorelei had a sudden thought, and dove towards the ground, using her weight to jab the torch towards the rear of the Ariados.

Enraged, it shrieked, and scurried forward, and Lorelei, anticipating the reaction, shot her left fist into the spider's web production sac. Squiealing again, the Ariados scurried away, and Lorelei could feel web coating her hand. Knowing that she didn't have a moment to lose, she swung her blazing brand around, and slashed it through the trailing web, before the Ariados could separate her strand of web from its main body.

She tensed as the fire roared up the web and onto her fist. She howled, and leaped to her feet, and suddenly realized that the Spinarak were once again pressing their attack. Howling in outrage, Lorelei jammed her fist into one of their eyes. While that did nothing to quell the flames, it did wonders to prevent that Spinarak from attacking again.

The rest of the Spinarak glanced warily from her flaming club, to her flaming hand, to Sneasel, which had just dropped the last of his original four opponents, to the writhing Ariados, and quickly scurried back into the forest.

Lorelei yelled like a woman possessed, charging after them with her flaming club in one hand, and her burning hand in the other. Terrified, they scattered before her, and suddenly she was facing the Ariados once more. Its entire backside was aflame, but was beginning to calm down.

The unquenchable pain that wracked her hand fueled her rage, and sent her surging forward with a scream of fury so terrible that, she heard later, caused all Pokemon to flee the area in a two mile radius, and stay away from it for three days. Then there was nothing but pain, slashing, and bleeding. After five minutes, the battle was over, and Lorelei stood over the defeated spider, staring down at its battered, broken frame. It was unconscious now, and would probably remain so for some time.

With a satisfied smirk, Lorelei glanced down at her badly burned left hand, and looked around for her Sneasel. It was waiting, staring at her with its mouth wide open, and seemed to have a new respect for her. It did, however, seem to be leaning forward more than usual, as if it were very tired. "Come on," she grumbled, glaring at her hand, "Let's get going."

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No fewer than seven hours later, they reached Cherrygrove City, just as all the late-night stores were beginning to close, and the moon was reaching its apogee. The eery silvery white light cast long shadows, and revealed the late-night trainers scurrying here and there for reasons that only they knew.

Lorelei wearily looked around the town, looking for the Pokemon Center. She needed some sleep, and she'd kill the next person who challenged her to a match before she could get some rest. She glanced down at her hand. It was still raw, but it was a little better after she had applied a Burn Heal and a few Potions to it, but it still looked terrible. She couldn't wait until she could get some sleep and get her wrist looked at.

It wasn't so bad at first, when she had something to hit, or even while the pain-killing agents in the Potion were in affect, but now, it just hurt. Pure, raw, unabated pain. And she couldn't use another Potion because she had fixed all she could with Potions, and, besides, she didn't have that many Potions, anyway.

She nearly wilted in relief as she spotted the Pokemon Center, and pushed the doors open. Despite the late hour, there was a large crowd gathered in the Pokemon Center, most of whom were standing around a poster.

One person, a boy that looked vaguely familiar, was expounding upon why he was going to win some tournament this year. His boasting was cut short abruptly when the Nurse Joy, who had been watching him with a bored expression on her face, looked over to Lorelei, and saw her hand.

The Nurse Joy let out a screech that ripped everyone's attention from the boy—what was his name—and over to the young woman that was standing before them in ripped clothing, a backpack that had only one strap remaining, and a badly burnt hand that was wrapped in parts of her aforementioned ripped-up clothing. "Lorelei?" a voice demanded, seconds before Nurse Joy and the rest of the two dozen or so people fell upon her.

It was too much for her, and she fell down, unconscious.

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"I'm fine!" she insisted, sighing into the video phone, and wishing that she'd at least gotten to Violet City before her parents had caught up with her. She had awoken after several hours of being unconscious to find that her hand was nearly completely healed, thanks to one of the Nurse Joy's Blisseys, and had immediately been spirited away to the array of videophones that lined one wall near the entrance.

There she found her parents on the line, from Saffron. They had at first demanded that she return to Kanto, and she had, of course, refused. Then her parents had threatened to come to Johto to take her back by force. Lorelei had shot that argument down by pointing out that she was registered in the Johto League, and, because she was over fifteen, she was considered an adult.

Her parents had then accused her of forging their signature, and Lorelei replied calmly that she had given the papers for them to sign as part of a collection of papers that allowed her to go into the Safari Zone, the one time she was in Fuschia City. That was a lie, but she wasn't about to admit that to her parents.

After that, they had seemed to resign themselves that there was nothing that they could do, and asked her where she was. Lorelei shook her head, grinning, as she broke the connection. This was it. Her parents knew about it, and she was still about to compete in the Johto League. This was going better than she had thought.

"Are you going to enter the competition?" the Nurse Joy asked cheerily. Lorelei turned to look at the woman questioningly, "That's why everyone was here last night. Cherrygrove is holding its annual Pokemon Tournament. The winner doesn't have to pay anything at any of the stores in Cherrygrove for the rest of his life."

Lorelei grinned, "That sounds great! Have you seen my Sneasel? I'm gonna enter him." She glanced around, wondering where her companion had gone.

The Joy's expression faltered. "Sneasel?" she asked, "Did you have a Sneasel?" she looked around, not meeting Lorelei's gaze. "Oh dear," she said quietly, "Oh dear. I'm afraid I have some bad news. Follow me."

Lorelei frowned, and followed the Nurse Joy through a door and into a hallway identical to the one that she had fled down the day before. She walked through the door that corresponded with the one she had tricked her fans into entering, and stopped cold. It was the emergency ward.

Aipom, Stantler, Ponyta, Squirtle, Pikachu—dozens of Pokemon lined the room, each in critical condition. Lorelei's scan stopped when she spotted Sneasel. And it was her Sneasel. She felt a lump suddenly form in her throat as she rushed to her side. "Oh no," she breathed. "Is she okay?" she demanded of the Nurse Joy as she watched her first Pokemon sleep before her."

"Lorelei," the Nurse Joy said softly, "I have to tell you something. From the Poison we extracted from its system when it came into the Pokemon Center, it was stung by Spinarak."

Lorelei nodded quickly, trying to stop the tears from blurring her vision, "Yes," she said quickly, "Yes, we fought off sixteen of 'em yesterday."

"Sixteen?" the Nurse Joy asked, then shook her head and continued, "Well, scientists aren't quite sure what it is, yet, but there's something more deadly about Spinarak poison than any other kind. It affects humans normally, but in Pokemon…" she trailed off, and looked at the floor.

Lorelei felt a fold fist clamp itself around her stomach, and turned slowly, as if in a bad dream. "What?" she asked slowly, "What does it do to Pokemon?"

Nurse Joy shuffled her feet, and sighed. "Do you know what a Carentamous Assembly is?" without waiting for Lorelei's response, she continued, "It's a part of the brain below the Brain Stem that stretches the entire length of the Central Nervous System. In some Pokemon, it extends past the Central Nervous System, and into its mouth, tail, or other areas of the body to allow it to perform special techniques, such as Flamethrower, Hydro Pump, Dragon Rage, or…" she paused, "Poison Sting."

Lorelei nodded, "Yeah," she said, "I know about Carentamous Assemblies. I'm friends with Professor Silph, and have gotten all the lectures about it. What's so special about Spinarak Poison Stings?"

The Nurse Joy swallowed. "In small doses," she said slowly, "Nothing." She paused and took a breath. "In large enough doses, however," she looked at the ground, "It begins to dissolve the Carentamous Assembly itself. Thus rendering the affected Pokemon essentially helpless in Pokemon Battles."

Lorelei turned back to her Sneasel, her face as white as it could possibly be, dreading the Nurse Joy's next words. "The Carentamous Assembly was essentially gone by the time that we got to her. To save your Sneasel's life, we had to surgically remove what was left of her Carentamous Assembly. Even now, there's not a big chance that she'll make it through."

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Lorelei walked into the main lobby of the Pokemon Center, still in a bit of shock. How had this happened? It wasn't supposed to. She'd had her journey all planned out. From here, she'd march over to Violet City and freeze Falkner Senior's birds out of the sky, then travel on to Azalea Town and beat the stuffing out of Bugsy's bugs. From there, she'd travel throughout Johto, eventually studying under either Morty or Pryce for a year, before returning to Kanto to defeat its league.

Now her plans were dashed to pieces. If she had been stronger, she would have been able to beat the Spinarak before they had stung Sneasel too many times. Had there been something that she could have done to help it before it. She felt tears spring into her eyes, and swiped at them angrily, looking around to make sure that no one had seen them, and got up.

She slowly got to her feet, and looked around. What was she doing here? She couldn't just sit here. She had to be doing something. That was just who she was. But first, she had to do something. Steeling herself, she moved towards the bank of phones.

Steeling herself, she drew the privacy curtain around herself, and keyed in a number to a place that she had once called home. On the third ring, the call was received. "Stephanie," she heard her brother say distractedly, as if he were doing something else, "If this is another one of your prank calls, I'm hanging up."

"Brandon?" Lorelei asked, hearing the word as if it were said by someone else. It was spoken with such fear, with such sorrow, with such…vulnerability and humility that it sounded as if someone else had said it.

Instantly, the vid-screen of the other side flickered on, and her brother's worried face appeared. "Lorelei?" he demanded, "What's wrong?"

Lorelei felt the tears come over her again, and this time, she couldn't contain herself. "Everything," she cried, laying her face on her wrists, "Everything." She repeated, crying harder than she could possibly have imagined a mere day before.

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Lorelei swallowed, composing herself. She'd somehow managed to tell her brother all that had happened since she had left, and convinced him to hold off telling her parents about Sneasel, at least for a few hours. "Lorelei," he said gently, "You can't stay in Cherrygrove. You've got to get back onto your feet, and back on your journey." Lorelei shook her head, tears flowing freely, grateful of the protection of the privacy screen, and the sound dampener that prevented outsiders of hearing her conversation. "Look, I know how this is for you, but you've got to keep going. I'll send you two more Pokémon. A Duskull and a Geodude. They're children of the other two, or, rather, three of your Pokemon that found mates."

Lorelei shook her head, "But what if I mess up with them, too?" she asked. She had been totally positive of what her path would be when she had started her journey to Johto, but now, with this happening…what if it was a sign that she wasn't supposed to go on a journey.

As if reading her thoughts, Lorelei heard her brother's voice urgently say, "Lorelei, I know it's hard. I know that you didn't expect this to happen. But this is what a Pokemon Journey is all about. Going out, finding adversity, and facing it. Sometimes you win, and sometimes you lose. Sometimes you lose a lot. But no matter what, you never give up. If you give up your Pokemon Journey after you begin it before you reach your goals, you ever even deserved to start the journey in the first place."

Lorelei slowly looked up at her brother, tears streaming down her face, her mouth feeling as if it would cramp up and permanently freeze up in a frown. "I'm trying," she said weakly, "I really am. But it's so hard."

Brandon's face split into a smile. "I know, Lorelei, I know it is. I felt the same way when my Dramon died. I received that from the Executive Chief of State of Tintia himself. When Dramon died…it took me years of soul-searching to find my way back. And most of that searching was done through the bottom of a bottle." He glanced down at his hands, then back up to Lorelei, "I-" he paused, "I don't want that to happen to you. Lorelei, here is my advice. You look around you, you find something worthwhile to fight for, and you go for it with all your might. And never, no matter what anyone says, give up that dream."

Lorelei smiled through her tear-streaked face, "Thanks," she said softly, "I appreciate it. I'll get right on it."

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Lorelei swiped at her cheek and turned a page on the giant book that lay before her. Her brother had told her to find something worthwhile to do, and, by Allnian, she'd find something. And that something was to find a way to heal Sneasel. No matter what. Then, a thought occurred to her, and her heart soared. That was it. Allnian!

She slammed the book shut, drawing glares from several people, and ran through the hallways of the library, looking for a specific book. Then she found it. Lorelei grinned, and brought it back to the table where she had been reading.

Sitting down, she opened the book. Inside the front cover was a picture of the majestic avion. In the picture, Allnian's dark lavender head was glaring at her from the page. A thin, black streak ran from its beak, over its eyes like a mask before narrowing to a thin line down its back, branching out onto each indigo, fifteen-foot wing, and finally down onto its tail, spreading thinly along the middle of each brilliant sapphire tail feather. Its talons, each three feet long, both grasped a fully grown Miltank in full flight.

The Titan Bird of Poison, Allnian was one of the few Legendary Pokemn that was actually confirmed to be real. Each year, over a thousand sightings were reported. Allnian held the power of illness. She could heal a person from an otherwise incurable disease, or afflict them with something so terrible, it could kill them in seconds. Allnian was a flighty bird, and used to having her own way. If she were provoked, there was no telling ho much damage she could cause. But if she were requested to do something that was in her power while she was in a good mood, she would accede to the request. And among Allnian's powers, according to the book before her, was the power to regenerate any organ of any creature, by means of a special germ that would reconstruct it—or so the scientists speculated.

Lorelei's eyes glittered, feeling the first real hope she had had since the Nurse Joy had told her that her Sneasel's Carentamous Assembly had been destroyed. Something stirred within her, something compelling her to go forward, find Allnian, and get her Sneasel healed.

She grinned. Nothing could stand in her way. Well, nothing after she picked up the Geodude and Duskull her brother was sending her.

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Lorelei smiled at the Nurse Joy as she received the two Pokeballs from the red-head. "Thanks," she said, and turned back towards the couch that lay against a wall. She took out her Pokedex, and flipped it open, beginning a scan of the device's interior for information on Allnian.

"Miss Winters?" she heard the Nurse Joy ask. She turned to look at the woman, who smiled. "Someone has been waiting for you."

Lorelei turned to look at where the woman was gesturing, and spotted a boy no older than fifteen standing there, arms crossed, appraising her. "So you're the great Lorelei Belle Winters," he said, smiling as he locked gazes with her. "Bruno can't stop talking about how good you must be that you beat him." Lorelei felt herself flush with embarrassment, and stranger grinned, "Or how much he's going to beat you by the next time you two meet."

Lorelei smiled. "Yeah," she said quietly, "I guess that's me. Who are you?" she asked quietly, looking the green-haired youth up and down. "And who gave you those military clothes? They don't fit you at all."

The boy smiled, "I'm Bugsy. Maybe you've heard of me? I'm the Azalea Town Gym Leader. As for the clothes…" he grinned, "Altan Army Surplus usually is green, and since I'm a Bug Trainer…" he trailed of, and shrugged. "Your brother sent me. He had a Menill teleport me. I'm told that they're capable of the longest range teleportation recorded? Remarkable creatures."

Lorelei's eyes narrowed. "Speaking of Menill," she replied, making a mental note to berate her brother at the next possible moment for sending someone to babysit her when she was fully capable of handling things herself, "I was wondering if you could help me with something."

Bugsy nodded, and leaned forward, "Sure, doll, whatever you want." Suddenly, Bugsy found himself on the floor, staring up at Lorelei's smirking face.

"First off," Lorelei said coolly, "Never call me 'doll.' Secondly, you're going to help me find Allnian," she said, grinning tightly, her arms crossed.

Bugsy swallowed. "But," he said, "I don't know anything about Allnian besides it's a Bird Legendary."

Lorelei's eyes narrowed. "You said you'd help," she said coldly, "You better learn a whole lot more. Like where she lives, and how I can find her. And how I can make her heal my Sneasel."

Bugsy frowned, "What's wrong with your Sneasel?"

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Several hours later, after Bugsy had explained to her that he barely knew anything about Allnian or the Flying-type beyond the type advantages, and she had explained to him what had happened to her, they began planning in earnest. Although Bugsy later could never remember exactly how he got dragged into the crazy scheme. Or how he had failed to get out of it.

"All right," Bugsy said, "We've already confirmed that we both know next to nothing about Allnian, right?" he asked, looking at the woman whom he'd come to know over the past several hours.

Lorelei nodded, "That's right. We don't even know where Allnian is living."

Bugsy nodded, "In that case, may I recommend going to the experts on bird Pokemon?"

Lorelei glanced at him. "Who?" she asked.

He smiled thinly, "Why, the Falkners, of course. They're only a Route away in Violet City."

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In a place where neither time nor space held any meaning, a lone figure watched the events unfolding, his feet metaphorically spread apart, his hands metaphorically at his metaphorical back. Of course, he wasn't really standing there. That wasn't how it worked there. It was his consciousness projecting the image from his previous memories onto his current point of view. The figure metaphorically smiled and brought himself back to his original train of thought. This was not supposed to happen. This was not the way the timeline was supposed to play out.

Someone had been tampering with it, he knew beyond a doubt. He suspected that, if he followed the trail of clues far enough, it would end up that the Dark One was to blame. This was unacceptable. If the Dark One were to escape…

For how long would the safeguards last, the metaphorical figure asked himself. How long would it be, until the Dark One escaped from his prison? How long until the battle to decide the fate of the world would take place again. One last, final, overwhelming time?

A final darkness would settle over the world. Mankind and Pokémon alike would be slaves to his will. Powerless against his sheer strength. He had been released once before…and only once, at the cost of his own life had the Dark One been restrained again. Well, not EXACTLY with his life, because his consciousness lived on, but…

Metaphorically he sighed. He'd never get used to life like this.

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Well, this is the last of Johto that you'll see until the very end of the fic. Well, except for the Bugsy spin-off that's gonna come out at around Chapter 16 or so.

Well, fellas, I guess I lost track of the chapters. Chapter SIX is where things take a sharp deviation from most journey fics. The next chapter will shock and amaze you.

Please, read and review.


	7. Orpheus

Yay!

More Reviews!

Gaby Y: I'm sorry, but Lance will NOT appear in THIS fic. however, he just might appear in the Bugsy Spin-off...:D

Redemmo: You ain't seen nothin' yet. I've got up to Chapter Eight written up, and reviews from the place I'm primarily posting this are pretty good. Wait 'till you see the battle in Chapter Eight. It's got MASS warfare. Not 2 vs. 2. HUNDREDS versus HUNDREDS...:D And yeah, I look forward to comparing our versions of Lorelei...:D

without further ado...onto Chapter Six!

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Hunger. Pain. Hunger. The creature wasn't sure who he was, but he knew that he was hungry. And that the hunger made him hurt. There was only one way to make the pain stop. Eat. Eat. Eat. But there was nothing to eat.

The behemoth roared, but nobody heard. He stamped his feet against some kind of surface, but nobody cared. He bit into the ground, but it burned his tongue. No, there was no way to ease the pain here. He had to get out. Out. And feed. No matter how many it took to satiate his hunger.

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"Solar Beam!" Falkner Junior yelled out, and watched as his Tropius fainted an opposing Growlithe. "That was a good battle," Falkner said, smiling, "But you may want to remember that although Sunny Day increases the power of Fire-type attacks, it dramatically lowers the amount of time Grass types have to wait to charge up for the Solar Beam Attack."

The trainer smiled at Falkner and ran out of the lab, shouting over his shoulder, "I'll be back, and I'll beat you!" Falkner waved as the young man ran out of his gym.

Falkner smiled at Tropius and recalled the Grass type. "Hey Joy," he called out to the small office door hidden behind a rather large tree a few yards behind him, "Tropius took quite a beating in that battle, she's gonna need to be healed."

The door opened and the familiar visage of a Nurse Joy poked her head out, and caught the Pokeball. "Tina told me to tell you that that was your last scheduled match of the day, and that your father is running a little late. Oh, and also, next time try not to make your Tropius hit this wall so much. It spilled her coffee three times."

Falkner laughed, "Well, I know how much of a neat freak she is," he said, grinning, "So I'll get out of her hair before she kills me."

"I heard that," the gym's secretary's voice drifted out of the back room, "I'll just kill you when you come in here to handle the paperwork. Oh, Falkner? Your dad gave me a letter to give to you."

Falkner frowned. A letter? Why would he give Falkner a letter? They were going to meet at the Missingno Casino for lunch. He walked into the room and closed the door behind himself. He took the letter, ripped it open, and scanned it quickly.

Falkner paled, and stumbled backwards into a chair. Swallowing hard, he reread the letter.

i>Dear Son,

I know that this will come as a bit of a shock to you, but I can't stay in Violet City any longer. I've been feeling crowded, and I know that this isn't the life for me, cramped in some office in some gym in some town—I like wandering the wilds, relying only upon my Pokemon.

I know that this will leave you in the lurch, but I have to go. Now. I have something coming up. Something kind of big. I hope that you'll be proud of me when you discover what it is. Until then, you're in charge of the gym and, by default, Violet City. Take good care of it, son. Don't let anything happen to it. I've left you my Skarmory and my Pidgeot. Please, son. Take good care of them. And don't think any less of me. This work that I have to do is among the most important the world has ever known. It will literally change the world.

Your Father,

James Travis Falkner /i>

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"Are we there yet?" Lorelei demanded, "My feet are sore!" She and her companion, the Azalea City gym leader, Bugsy, had been walking since before the break of day to try to reach Violet City, home of the Falkners, who knew the more about birds than most people would know about anything in their lifetime. And, hopefully, he'd know about a bird named Allnian, who was Lorelei's Sneasel's only hope of returning to its former battling self.

The Sneasel had had an extremely large amount of poison put into him, enough that it actually dissolved most of his Carentamous Assembly, the part of a Pokemon that allowed it to perform its special attacks, or techniques as they were also called.

Bugsy, a bug-type gym leader, shook his head and sighed. "Like I told you five minutes ago, Lorelei, we're at least a mile off. It'll be a while before we get there." Lorelei made a face at him as he looked at a map, and continued walking.

Suddenly, over where Lorelei guessed was Violet City, something blossomed out of thin air. An enormous silvery—portal the only thing that Lorelei would later be able to describe it as—opened, and for a moment, nothing happened. It looked like a whirlpool. The entire thing was a dark silver. She couldn't see anything past the center of the whirlpool thing. It almost reminded her of pictures of black holes she had seen.

Then, with a nearly bone-shattering screech, a form shot out of the vortex, and spun nearly on a dime. It roared again, and the portal—whirlpool in the sky thing—closed, and disappeared as if it had never been. The dragon, however, remained.

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Falkner smiled at Julius Grant, the owner of the Missingno Casino as he entered Violet City's finest establishment. "How's the restaurant doing?" Falkner asked, hoping that he sounded a lot more happy than he felt.

"So so," the proprietor replied, "Big thing's the casino. We have your usual table waiting for you sir. Your father sends his apologies, but he won't be able to meet you." He rubbed his large hands over his rather large gut almost nervously.

Falkner nodded, "Thanks, Julius, but I already knew that." Falkner nodded once more, and walked towards the back of the casino, muttering to himself. For sixteen years he'd come to depend upon his father, and now his father had simply abandoned him. How was that supposed to—

There was a large crash, and a cloud of dust blew out of the restaurant area. Suddenly, he could hear people screaming, and the temperature inside the casino began rising rapidly. Then one of the windows burst inwards, and fire roared through the empty windowpane. Falkner could feel the glass biting into his skin, and he ran for the door. Another window shattered inwards, and another gout of flame roared through. Then another, and another.

Within seconds, what had been Violet City's pride and joy was nothing less than a scene of chaos. Flames were everywhere, and people were running for the doors. Falkner, being one of the closest to the doors, made it out shortly after Julius. And was the last one out. The building collapsed in on itself, crushing countless dozens of men, women, and Pokemon in its fiery collapse.

Falkner lay on the ground, breathing hard and coughing, and looked up into the sky, to see a huge, silvery dragon filling up most of the sky above the city. Dozens of Pokemon were attacking it, but it ignored every attack. It snorted, and fire came out of its nostrils and consumed the top floor of the Sprout Tower. It scanned the ground, but stopped when it came upon him. It roared, and began shifting its body weight for a dive. With a feeling of absolute horror, Falkner realized that the dragon was after him.

He reached for his Pokeballs, and realized with horror that, as was his usual custom, he'd left them back at the gym, so he wouldn't be challenged. Falkner groaned and leaped to his feet. The gym wasn't that far away, but he'd already seen what the dragon could do. He wasn't really in the mood to see it destroy his gym as it had destroyed the Missingno.

He burst through the doors, knowing he smelt of smoke and his clothes were probably smoldering, and ran for the office. He jerked the door open and yelled inside, "Violet's under attack! Get all the Pokemon out of here, and then you get out of here!"

Tina immediately tossed him his Pokeball belt and dove for the basket of Pokeballs that the Nurse Joy was preparing to heal. Falkner immediately turned and ran back outside the gym, releasing all of his Pokemon—Xatu, Fearow, Dodrio, Tropius, Altaria, Murkrow, plus his father's Skarmory—as soon as he was able.

The dragon, he saw, had not been idle while he had been inside. The Pokemon Center was in shambles, and the Pokemon Mart was in flames. He doubted that it would be able to be salvaged. "Tropius!" he yelled at the first Pokemon he'd ever had, "Solar Beam. Xatu, Psychic; Fearow, Mirror Move; Dodrio, Tri-attack; Altaria, Sky Attack; Murkrow, Crunch!" Falkner darted forwards, trying to find some cover, and the fire that consumed his gym—and his two assistants inside, he realized with horror—barely missed him.

His Pokemon performed admirably, but they just weren't able to do enough. Murkrow wasn't even able to get close enough to do anything. He was swatted down by on of the dragon's massive wings. Fearow was caught in a stream of fire that consumed seven other birds.

The Dragon roared and swept his head to the side, swallowing whole at least a dozen birds, and several humans riding some of them. Falkner stared in horror. What was this thing? Was there no stopping it?

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The metaphorical figure frowned. This was something completely new. So the Dimensional War had begun, had it? Yes, it had. It had begun with unleashing a modified form of a legendary into the skies over Violet City, and letting it do its work. A particularly powerful legendary at that. Drago was known for a nearly insatiable appetite when he was hungry, and this derivative of Drago must surely be hungry. He had to hand it to the Dark One, this was certainly the most impressive spectacle of inter-dimensional travel he'd ever come across.

However, if he didn't do something, the modified Drago would destroy first Violet City, then head for the next biggest center of population. Goldenrod city. That would be a major point in history, further on for these people. So was violet, come to think of it. If either were destroyed, history would be irreparably changed.

So now it was time to step in.

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Lorelei charged forwards, ignoring Bugsy's pleas for her to stay back where it was safe. She released both of her Pokemon. "Geodude!" she yelled, "Rock Throw! Duskull, Night Shade!" the two Pokemon nodded their agreement, and the Geodude ripped a large amount of soil out of the ground and threw it at the dragon. Duskull sent several waves of shimmering black energy so powerful that they rippled reality itself towards the dragon. But all the attacks did was to annoy the dragon.

Lorelei saw the tail moving and dove to the ground. Geodude wasn't so lucky. The tail hit him with such force that he exploded, and what was left of the rock type was sent flying over the treetops and into a lake.

Duskull, however, was unaffected by the tail, as it passed through her. Lorelei opened her mouth to shout out a command, but the dragon turned its head, and snorted. A jet of flame roared in towards her Duskull, who was flashing for some reason, and consumed the Ghost. When the flames faded, there was nothing left.

Suddenly the dragon reeled in pain, and roared in agony. Trees, buildings, and Pokemon alike were torn from where they stood as the dragon crashed to the ground. It continued thrashing for several minutes, and trainers and Pokemon began to peek out from where they had hidden, wondering if the attack was over. And then Lorelei understood what Duskull had done a split second before the flames had consumed her. Destiny Bond.

Then the dragon stopped moving, rolled over, and came up onto its feet. Its eyes were more enraged than it had been before, and it began moving slowly back towards the town, the ground trembling with each massive footfall. Lorelei paled as she stared up at the dragon towering over her. She had no Pokemon left, and there was no way that she'd be able to defeat it.

There was a sense of shock and horror that rippled through the people assembled in Violet City, and then resigned silence as they readied themselves once more, for an attack that never came.

Suddenly, from behind the dragon, another portal opened. It looked very much like the one that had spawned the dragon, but this silver was bright, almost to the point of being white. Once again it looked like a black hole, and this time, the analogy was very apt as the dragon was somehow hurled backwards through the vortex. The moment the last of the dragon was through the portal, both disappeared. There was a wary silence, as if they expected the creature to come at them again, from some other angle.

Lorelei merely lay where she had watched first Geodude and then Duskull killed ruthlessly. She had failed. Again. First Sneasel, and now Geodude and Duskull. The offspring of her original team.

Lorelei felt sick.

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Falkner stiffly walked through the ruins of what had been one of the most beautiful towns in Johto. Wreckage, bodies, and rubble were everywhere. How many, he wondered, had died. How long would it take for the wreckage to be cleared? He looked to his right. At least the Sprout Tower had been saved. Mostly.

The top three floors were gone, as were most of the monks. The lower floors were generally for tourists, and the top three floors were where the monks lived and trained.

Falkner felt like he was about to throw up. Who would want to do something like this? He'd lost Fearow, Tropius, Dodrio, Xatu, and Altaria in the attack. That left only Murkrow and his father's Skarmory.

His father…he had abandoned him. On the same day. Within an hour of each other, Falkner realized, two major catastrophes had occurred. Falkner sat down across from where the burned-out hulk of his gym had been. At least he hadn't let his father store their library in the gym, he thought.

Then he could hold it in no longer. He bent his head down to his knees, and began to cry.

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The metaphorical figure metaphorically stared through the viewing portal to the dimension to which he'd sent the dragon. It was impossibly powerful. He had barely managed to capture the twisted Drago simile. If it hadn't been for the Duskull's Destiny Bond, he wouldn't have been able to stop it.

He shook his head. He had thought that he was more powerful than anyone or anything else in the Physical Realm, but this?

He shuddered. If the Dark One had more of these creatures, then when the war finally came, it would be very bloody, and very brutal, with high casualties on both sides. And that was if it were in the Other Realms. If it were in the Physical Realm…

The figure metaphorically shivered. If it were in the Physical Realm, then the war would be horrendous.

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Lorelei stood quietly, watching Falkner and Bugsy talking in the middle of Falkner's library. Bugsy had found Falkner within minutes of the strange disappearance of the dragon, and Falkner had invited them to his family's private library, a half mile outside of town. Falkner seemed down about something, but she hadn't asked what he was sad about.

Lorelei, on the other hand, was furious. Every single Pokemon that she'd managed to have on this journey had been a descendant of one of her Altan team before she'd moved to Kanto. And now, they were either dead or seriously injured. Her eyes narrowed, and she glanced around the fancy library. She wanted to punch something. There had to be something that she could find to fight around here.

Just before she would have walked out of the room to see if she could pick a fight with one of the fighting type Pokemon she'd seen on her way in to try to work out some of her anger, Bugsy came back over to her. Falkner, she noticed, had moved to one of the walls, and was scanning it intently. "Falkner said that he's got several books on Allnian. He's going to go find them, and then he's going to go out and find out exactly how much damage there is to the city."

Lorelei nodded, and took out her Pokedex, to check on the download she had started earlier. She was downloading everything that Silph Company had for public consumption about Allnian. At the current rate, it would take several hours. "All right, then," she said quietly, "Let's get started. And once I've fond Allnian, I'm going to find whoever let that dragon loose over Violet City and personally wring his neck."

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"Got it," Bugsy said five hours later. Lorelei looked up, and took her feet off of the library's desk.

Her spirits soared. They'd been going through books for hours and hours, but so far they hadn't found anything even remotely suggesting where Allnian might be. "You know where Allnian is?" she asked.

Bugsy shook his head, "No, but I think I know what kind of dragon attacked Violet City." He put the book on the table, spun it around, and pushed it towards her. "A Drago."

Lorelei frowned and closed the cover most of the way, keeping her finger between the pages where the Drago was, and looked at the title on the spine. She frowned. "You found it in _A Thousand and One Things About Allnian_?" She demanded, "What's it doing in there?"

Bugsy grinned and took the book back, "Well, the Dragon, Drago, is apparently supposed to be good friends with Allnian, and the two are rarely any more than a hundred miles apart from each other. Drago has an enormous appetite, and is rarely seen except when he becomes hungry. And then…" he trailed off, and his face paled, "And then," he said quietly, "Drago has been known to eat the population of entire countries before he is satiated."

Lorelei and Bugsy stared at each other uneasily. Lorelei shifted uncomfortably. "So," Lorelei said, "If it's still hungry, then…"

Bugsy nodded, "Then this isn't the last we've seen of him."

Lorelei sighed and ran a hand through her hair, which, she realized with a start, was a mess. "Then we've got to stop Drago, too. Just our luck that Allnian and Drago are so close to each other."

Bugsy nodded miserably. "We threw the combined power of almost two hundred fifty trainers at it, and it didn't even seem to notice. Except for that Destiny Bond at the end. And even then, it got back up as if it were nothing." Lorelei could see the fear in his eyes. "And we've got to stop this thing."

Lorelei swallowed hard. She had known that her mission to find Allnian would be nearly hopeless. It was a legendary, after all, and it wasn't likely to listen to her. And now, the impossibility factor of their mission had just quadrupled.

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A woman watched the men and women scurrying around Violet City, trying to clean up the death and destruction that had consumed the city. She shook her head. They'd actually managed to prevent it from razing the city to the ground this time. In her future, Violet City had been completely destroyed, as had Azalea, and Goldenrod had been severely damaged before they had managed to kill it.

She glanced to her left, and saw her partner silently surveying the damage as well. He looked at her, and smiled faintly. Their plan had indeed worked. Transferring the Winters girl to Kanto had indeed prevented the complete destruction of Violet and Azalea. And from there, she would take care of The War, if all of their calculations had been correct. If The War were taken care of, then the Dark Elite would never come about, and the world would remain safe for at least another decade or two.

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"Seventy humans are dead." Lorelei looked up from the book she was reading to see Falkner standing in the doorway, his clothes stained with blood, and his clothes a torn and filthy mess. "And the death toll is still rising." Out of the corner of her left eye, she could see Bugsy getting up, "Twenty are still missing. Ninety humans are injured." He continued reciting the toll the dragon had taken on Violet City as he walked stiffly towards a chair. "Sprout Tower's all but destroyed, the Gym's unsalvageable, the Missingno is gone. Over three hundred Pokemon died that we know of. That's trained AND wild," he said, his voice getting quieter and quieter.

Bugsy took a deep breath, "Would it help if I told you we knew who did this?" he asked quietly.

Falkner looked up at him, and nodded slowly. He looked so pathetic, Lorelei would have laughed if the situation weren't so dire. Bugsy took a deep breath and handed the book he had shown Lorelei earlier to Falkner. Falkner paled, and he visibly shrank from the picture. "It's a legendary!" he whispered as he read the information on the page opposite the picture, "how are we supposed to defend against it if it comes back?"

Lorelei heard a faint beep, and took out her Pokedex. The download she'd requested was done. "Me and Lorelei are going out to find it. We're going to kill it."

Falkner asked quietly, "Do you know where Allnian and Drago are now?"

Bugsy grimaced, and opened his mouth to say something, but Lorelei interrupted him, "Give me ten minutes, I'll have the general location." She stood up, and held out her Pokedex for examination, "The download of all information regarding Allnian just finished." She said to Bugsy. She turned to Falkner, "I set it to create a map of the world to show where all the sightings were. It'll take about ten minutes to compile."

Ten minutes later, they had it. "Nuschantz," Bugsy said softly, "ski capital in the world. Not to mention the biggest tourist trap that there is. No public transportation, except for expensive bush pilots. No roads, not even any cities. They've got skiresorts instead." He looked up at Lorelei, "This isn't going to be easy."

Lorelei glanced over at Falkner, who was still sitting in the same chair he had been ten minutes before, and was nearly catatonic, "Yeah, but we've got to. It's the only way to make sure that Drago doesn't hurt any more people."

Bugsy nodded, "All right, then. Meet me at the Cherrygrove Pokemon Center. We'll go on to New Bark Town together. I've got to go back to Azalea to get my things together and make sure that the gym is taken care of."

Lorelei smiled faintly, "Road trip."

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Bugsy closed his eyes, trying to ignore the chatter that was coming at him from all sides. "ALL RIGHT!" he yelled, and was gratified to hear that there was silence. He looked at his younger sisters. They were twins, and sometimes he was amazed that the ten year-olds could make so much noise. "Look," he said, trying not to raise his voice, "I'm not going to abandon you. Brandon just needs me to take care of his sister."

The twins giggled, and Bugsy shot them a dark look. "Ooh," Molly said in a lilting voice, "Brandon wants you to take care of his sister!"

"Yeah," Holly chimed in, "um…Brandon wants you to take care of his sister!"

Bugsy shook his head, "You guys are nuts. Seriously. There's nothing going on. I'm just going to Nuschantz. All right?" The twins glanced at each other, then started giggling again. Bugsy sighed and did a quick last check to make sure that he had everything he needed, then turned to his sisters. "All right," he said, "Mom and Dad are going to be gone in Sintaur for another three months, so I have some instructions for you. Rule number one," he said, looking pointedly at Molly, "No parties."

His sister made a face at him, and he continued, "Number two, If someone challenges you to a match for a gym battle, DON'T use your own Pokemon. Use they Gym Pokemon. Don't use them for ANYTHING else. No more using Scyther to mow the lawn! Got that?" he asked. When he got a nod and a giggle from both of them, he continued, "Number three, Aunt Mary is coming over every day to check up on you. Four. You know where the food is. If you run out, do NOT go shopping yourself. Get Nurse Joy or Officer Jenny to do it for you. They'll both be checking in on you too. For you laundry, get Nurse Joy to do it. NOT Officer Jenny. I think we all remember what happened last time, right?"

The twins looked at each other and giggled. Bugsy had to admit that now, after the fact, it was pretty funny. Officer Jenny had gotten one of the people she'd detained for doing something and had made him do their laundry. They'd barely been able to salvage anything from what he'd done.

Bugsy looked at his sisters and realized that he was really about to leave. "You guys," he said slowly, "You guys take care, all right?" he said, feeling himself begin to tear up. The twins launched themselves into his outstretched arms, and they hugged. "I don't know how long I'll be back," he said, "I'll send you stuff back from Nuschantz." As he hugged his sisters, Bugsy wondered in the back of his mind whether he'd be coming back from Nuschantz, considering his mission was to kill a Legendary, and force another to bend to his and Lorelei's will.

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Lorelei petted the fur of her injured Sneasel, transferred from the Cherrygrove Pokemon Center, lovingly, and knew that it would be the last time she'd see it for several days. It was lying on a medical bed, with wires and tubes sticking into it from all angles. Its spines on its back were broken, the entire right side of its face was badly mangled, and the Nurse Joy had had to amputate its left arm.

Lorelei bowed her head and felt the tears flowing. She couldn't stand to see her Pokemon like this, but she knew that there was nothing she could do. Until she found Allnian. Allnian was the only thing in the world that could heal this kind of damage. According to many legends she had found that were centered on Allnian, Allnian could heal anything-as long as it was still alive. No damage was too great-although if the spark of life had left the Pokemon or human's body, there was nothing it could do.

Lorelei's face hardened, and she forced herself to stop crying. That was why she would make Allnian heal her Sneasel. There was no other way. She HAD to do something. She couldn't just sit around and do nothing.

She felt a hand on her shoulder, and a voice in her ear, "It's time, darling," she heard Nurse Joy say softly, "Sneasel needs his rest."

She nodded and got up, and walked into the main lobby, and saw Bugsy, standing there with a suitcase, a Scyther, and a Pinsir. "You ready?" she asked, swiping angrily at her eyes.

Bugsy looked at her sympathetically, "Yeah, Lorelei, I'm ready. Let's go. It's time to achieve the impossible."

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And that, my friends, is the show. I hope that you enjoyed this chapter, as it only gets better from here.

Coming up in Chapter 7: A rather interesting plane ride.


	8. A Flight to Remember

First off, thanks for the reviews, everyone! Three in one chapter! it's a record for one of my non-romance fics, I think...now, I'll address your reviews one at a time

Ri2: who says that poison Pokemon AREN'T uber-powerful? I mean, yeah, in the games there weren't, but in my writing, almost anything goes. Allnian IS one of the most powerful Pokes out there. She can heal or inflict any disease known (or unknown) to man. She could literally take down armies in seconds. And she isn't even my most powerful legendary. Allnian's name was originally Aillnian, btw, but through time, I somehow kept forgetting to put down the "i." By the time that I remembered, it was too late. :D

Gaby Y: Thanks for the review. don't worry, Falkner WILL make an appearance later in the fic. He's actually quite important.

Luna Tiger: Thanks for pointing that out. I didn't realize that. However, in my fan fiction, if a Pokemon is the same type as the attack, and it's logically possible for it to learn the said attack, there's a good chance that the Poke will know it. I follow my own set of rules when I'm writing. While I'm not constrained by the anime/games, I do draw a LOT from them. sorry I didn't point that out earlier.

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Things were moving far too quickly. The changes in the timeline that had been happening sporadically were now coming faster and faster. Some of his men were scrambling to correct the changes, but he would soon have to report to the Council, and get their support. The figure was no longer sure that it was simply one person or faction that was making the changes. There were at least two. He suspected that he knew who, besides the Dark One.

The Dark One's power was growing considerably, as well. If a direct intervention to interrupt the most major change in the timeline wasn't attempted soon, then all of his work in the Physical Realm would be for naught. He had spent hundreds of years trying to stop the Dark One, only to have much of his work foiled when humans in the future mastered the art of time travel.

True, he had just under five years to fix everything if things kept accelerating at their present rate, but he wasn't sure if that would be fast enough. He had been the first to experiment with inter-dimensional travel into the Physical Realm. The rest of The Council had spent far too much time as non-corporeal entities.

The figure smiled, wondering what it would be like to be corporeal again. He had almost forgotten what food tasted like. Maybe, if worst came to worst and he had to go to the Physical Realms himself, he'd try some of their new culinary concoctions, such as "pizza" or perhaps what they called a "cheeseburger."

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"I hate this," Lorelei muttered, shifting in her seat, making her newly-died, oldly short blue hair swirl around slightly, and her longer, unchanged blond hair swish into Bugsy's face. What had she been thinking, dying it like she had? Her black hair was perfectly fine. Had been perfectly fine.

Bugy sputtered and pushed her hair out of his face, "What is it now?" he groaned, "I'm almost afraid to ask. Look, the Nurse Joy in Cherrygrove said that your Sneasel will be waiting for you at the Verin Retreat. The Pilot said that there was a zero percent probability of the plane spontaneously combusting, you saw for yourself that the flight attendant's tray carts aren't going to be sliding around all over the place, you've been told a dozen times that flying is safer than taking a Pokémon journey, you checked with the Global Police to make sure that Team Aero hasn't been spotted sniffing around our route, and you've chewed out I don't know how many food venders, which led to our orders being canceled! Is there something that you need, your highness? Or is something else bothering you, perhaps?" he sighed and leaned against the back of his seat, "Maybe there are too many people on the plane, or will we be flying too high." He grumbled quietly, "Or, horrors, maybe you've suddenly come down with a dislike of the ice and snow of cold old Nuschantz."

Lorelei made a face at him. "Yes," She said darkly, "Yes, yes, and I have ALWAYS hated cold weather. That's why I liked living in Alto, and, to a lesser extent, Kanto. It's ALWAYS warm there. Unless you're way up high." She shook her head and glanced around, and began speaking louder, so that one of the flight attendants, who was passing out beverages, could hear, "On top of that, the seats are too small, the food is disgusting, the wait to get onboard was way too long, I don't have enough room to put my baggage, and, oh, I'm not going anywhere near the bathrooms on this thing! Plus, I think that somebody forgot to replace the muffler in this stupid plane's stupid engines!"

Bugsy sighed and looked around the cabin of the plane, knowing that everyone was getting annoyed with Lorelei. She had been complaining non-stop ever since he'd met up with her in Cherrygrove City. Frankly, he was fed up with her, but if he said anything, she'd probably beat him up with all the martial arts that she knew.

And if she complained this much in first class…he shook his head. What would she have done if they had gone in the business class. As it was, the seats in the small cabin were rather spacious for airline seats. Obviously Lorelei hadn't flown very many times. He grinned and looked out the window. The engines weren't really that loud. Well, by airline standards. And it was true that the food was disgusting. But, unfortunately, he didn't have much of a choice.

He glanced over at Lorelei, and realized that she had been going on about something while his mind had been wandering, and suddenly realized that she had asked him a question, and was staring at him expectantly. "Um," Bugsy replied hesitantly, "Yes?"

Lorelei's eyes narrowed, "You think," she hissed slowly, "That the free enterprise system is perfect in that those that are rich can stay rich indefinitely, thus promoting the illusion that dictators are the norm? You think that the CEOs of Silph Company or Specter Corp would make good world rulers!"

Bugsy blinked. Had she really been talking about that? He'd really been zoned out, then. "Um, can I change my answer?" he asked, suddenly sorry that he'd let her have the aisle seat.

He raised his arm to protect himself from the flurry of fists that his traveling partner intended to move his skull a good distance, and felt his eardrums begin to ring as she started shouting at him. She probably knew, he mused to himself as his arm was pummeled, and he tried to turn his back to her, that he hadn't been listening to her. And that probably explained why she was hitting him so hard, while yelling at him for accidentally saying the wrong thing when he hadn't been listening.

Suddenly, the rain of blows stopped, and he turned to see Lorelei attacking a flight attendant who probably had tried to stop her from hitting him. He shook his head and grabbed her arms, thus diverting her attention back to him. And he didn't have his arms up to protect himself. He saw the flight attendant making a hurried withdrawal from her section of the plane, and turned aside as Lorelei showed no signs of stopping anytime soon.

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The operative glanced over at the left side of the cabin, where a pair of teenagers he had assumed to be a couple were apparently having an argument. And the female was hitting the male. He didn't really care if they were fighting or not, but if he was correct, the male was Bugsy, the Azalea Town gym leader. He would do fine. He frowned, and suddenly he recognized the girl. It was the daughter of Silph Company's National Supervisor, Lorelei Belle Winters. His eyes glittered. She would make a fine prize.

Surely the Kantans and the Johtans would force the Retreat to accede to their request with two such valuable hostages aboard. And if they didn't…well, he'd be forced to make an example of the pair.

Should he begin it now? He glanced out the window, and ran his hand over his shaved head. To any that looked at him, he would appear bald. But, no. He wasn't over Nuschantz yet. They were still over the ocean. It would do no good to begin until they were in Nuschantian airspace.

He settled back into his chair and began reading, glancing over at the woman sleeping beside him once. He smiled. In just a few hours, her life would change in ways that she could not possibly expect. As would the lives of everyone on this plane. They had no clue what was about to happen to them. It would change the course of their lives forever. If any of them survived, they would always remember what happened on this particular flight.

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"Well, Gertal," the man said to the man in the jail cell, "It looks like we got you this time. Your men have been messing with the Jynx teleportation sites. Hijacking and stealing supplies from our trade convoys." The man paced in front of the cell, "We've finally got you." He smirked, "And you're not going anywhere."

The man in the cell, a tall, broad-shouldered man, ran a hand through his red hair and looked up at the man taunting him, and smiled evenly, "Lefar," he said quietly, "I promise you that I gave no such orders. I know that we've had our differences of opinion politically, but I don't see why you have to jail me because of a political entity."

The man who had been called Lefar stiffened, and glared at his prisoner with penetrating emerald eyes, "A political entity?" he spat, "Is that what Team Blizzard is? It's nothing but another gang of thugs, out to make a fast buck at the expense of innocents. That, Gertal, is what your creation has become. It's no better than Team Magma or Team Aqua."

Gertal shot to his feet, his bedraggled clothing swirling around him as if they were in a tempest, and he stalked to the door of the cell, and grabbed the bars, "Don't you dare," he said slowly, "compare the Blizzard Party to Team Aqua or Team Magma. Yes, we are now more than a mere political party, but that was out of necessity because of your persecution. At our core, we do not seek military might, or conquest of one person, party, or type over another, as Team Aqua and Magma do. We seek equality for those who wander the vast reaches of Nuschantz with those that live in posh resorts catering to fat tourists!" he spat out, shaking his head.

"Watch your tongue, Gertal," Lefar cautioned, "Remember that you are in one of those posh resorts, and that I made it specifically to cater to," he paused, then said sarcastically, "Fat tourists. We have finally captured you, and you WILL stand trial for what your men have done. While you stand here and say that your men are not martial in nature, I've heard reports of three more raids into sequential Jynx Teleportation sites. That cuts off the North parts of our country from our Southern. The Bush Pilots have also reported that at least two hundred of your men are marching on the retreat even as we speak! Do you call those the actions of a political party?"

Gertal shook his head, "No," he said quietly, "Eltan wouldn't allow it. He knows what we are trying to do. How we're trying to change Nuschantz."

"Open your eyes, Gertal!" Lefar exploded, "Your 'political party' is good for nothing but to fill spaces in the Mendall Retreat's prison cells! Your men are dangerous thugs who will use whatever force is necessary to complete their mission. THAT is why you are under arrest, and THAT is why you will not be sent anywhere but the Mendall Retreat. Your men that are coming to rescue you will be defeated, I assure you."

Gertal shook his head, "They can't be coming for me. That would defeat everything that I have done. Eltan wouldn't allow them to do such a thing. I know him. He wouldn't allow war to erupt between the Resorters and the nomads."

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Eltan glanced at his watch, and smiled. It was time to get things started. He reached under the seat in front of him and pulled out his suitcase. The woman beside him had woken up, and was reading, now. He glanced out the window, and smiled. They were over Nuschantian soil. He put the suitcase on his tray table and turned it so that no one else would be able to see what was inside.

The other passengers on the plane would think that he were odd, certainly, but he doubted they'd do anything else. He glanced inside, and turned off the ECM counter-jammer. The small device had made his suitcase appear to carry clothes when passed through an X-ray device, thus hiding its true contents.

Smiling, he reached inside and felt around, and found the two things he wanted. He smiled as his fingers closed around the comforting cold steel of the pistol and the small, cylindrical signaling device. Carefully, he quickly stuffed the gun underneath his shirt, and set the signaler on the tray table. He put the suitcase under back under the seat in front of him, and leaned back. All he needed to do now was wait for the flight attendant.

After that, he would have control of the plane within minutes. And he'd be able to redirect it to the Blizzard base. And then, Lefar Verin would have no choice but to release Gertal Tenlin, the founder and leader of Team Blizzard. And if he refused, he would have Gertal anyway. Eltan smiled, and closed his eyes, knowing that no one had seen the gun, and that his plan was fool-proof. Blizzard's new allies would make sure that he wouldn't fail. Soon, the nomads of Nuschantz would control it. And there would be nothing the resorters would be able to do.

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Lorelei glared at the flight attendant, who glanced around, probably wondering if there was some place she could escape to. Lorelei, for her part, was annoyed. Very annoyed. "What do you mean," she hissed, "that ya don't have it. Let me tell you one more time what I want, and it had better be on my tray table. I want Grape Spritz. Not Hilly Mist, not any other kind of soda. I want Grape Spritz!"

The flight attendant sighed, and glanced around the plane's cabin once more, "I'm sorry," she said, and Bugsy could tell that she was genuinely sorry. "We don't have Grape Spritz. Can I interest you in—" she began before Lorelei cut her off.

"No." Lorelei adamantly declared. "I said I wanted Grape Spritz. If I tell you what kind of soft drink I want, I EXPECT to get it!" Out of the corner of her eye, Lorelei say Bugsy lean forward like he was about to say something. A swift push from one of her arms fixed that. Lorelei eyed the flight attendant and her cart as if she were hiding Grape Spritz somewhere, and then Lorelei said slowly, "I'll take water."

She glanced over at Bugsy, "Do you want anything?" she asked the purple-haired gym leader. He smiled and opened his mouth, but before he could say anything, Lorelei swung her head around and glared at the flight attendant as she set the water down in front of her. "He's fine," she said quickly, "Go ahead and move along."

Bugsy chuckled, "You owe me money," he said, putting a hand between the seats. Lorelei whirled to face him, "I told you she'd settle for water." Lorelei glared at him.

"Yeah," she heard somebody say from behind her, "But I told you that she wouldn't let you get anything. We're even."

Bugsy frowned, "Nope. That bet was ten. The one that I won was eighty. Pay up." Lorelei glared at him even harder. He smiled apologetically at her.

"Who's that," she demanded, as Bugsy's hand came back through the seat filled with money.

Bugsy grinned, "Nobody special. Just one of my friends from Saffron University." Lorelei heard someone grumbling behind her.

Lorelei shook her head and held out her hand. "Hand it over," she said quietly, in a reasonable tone. "You earned it off of me. That means that I should get all of the proceeds."

Bugsy grinned and shook his head, "Sorry, darling, but that wasn't part of the deal."

Lorelei's eyes narrowed, and as her left arm snaked out and struck him in the throat, her right ripped the money from his hands. Bugsy collapsed into his seat, coughing. A hand quickly appeared over the front of her seat, holding a roll of bills that Lorelei surmised was for another bet Bugsy had made. Lorelei smiled, and said pleasantly, "There, that wasn't so bad, was it?"

Bugsy was too busy trying to breathe to respond to her.

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Eltan looked over at the young couple, and chuckled as the man was forced to give his girlfriend what probably amounted to protection money. The flight attendant whose back he had his pistol shoved into flinched, but continued towards the front of the plane. "You understand, don't you," he said when she continued moving, and didn't try to move away, "That it's nothing personal. And that I'll shoot you if you do anything I don't want you to. And that includes talking. Let's just go up and have a nice little chat with the captain."

The flight attendant nodded stiffly, and moved forward. To her credit, she was holding up rather well. A quick glance across the center row of seats showed that Letvarin was moving towards the galley, and the elevator to the lower level. Where all the guns and heavy equipment was. Right now, he just had a tiny Derringer, but soon, he'd have one of the heaviest sub-machine guns that had been manufactured by man.

Another of the men, Tenlogh, had a weapon he had designed and made himself. In theory, it would chill the air in the direction so much that it would freeze the very molecules of ice in the air, much as an ice beam would. The trick, Tenlogh had told him, was not to hold down on the triggering switch too long, and freeze whoever you wanted knocked out of the way. You just wanted a blast long enough to send the target back, reeling and out of the battle. He was their sleeper in first class. In less than a minute, one of the stewardesses would be up here, and would assist Gentargh in holding that section of the plane.

The Business Class section of the plane, meanwhile, would be covered by no fewer than ten people, simply due to the fact that that was where most of the Pokemon trainers would be, considering the price of tickets.

Eltan had achieved the cockpit. "Open the door," he whispered to the flight attendant, "And go through it." The woman opened the door and stepped through. Eltan followed her, closed the door, and hit the back of her head with the butt of the pistol. "Don't move," he said, leveling the gun at the pilot, and locking the cockpit door with his other. "Or I will shoot you. Attempt to contact anyone outside of the plane, and you will die." His eyes narrowed, "Believe me, I know how to use this. And I will not hesitate to do so, if it suits my purposes."

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Bugsy sighed and shook his head, "No," he said quietly, "The training of Pokemon is not an inhumane indoctrinating practice set out by the governments of the world to surreptitiously raise an army for world domination. Trust me," he said, groaning, "I'd know."

Lorelei's eyes glittered as she reveled in the debate, "Ah," she said enthusiastically, "But what if that was part of their plan, and didn't reveal it to you?" she demanded. "What if you're just another pawn in the game of international conquest?"

Bugsy opened his mouth to reply, but then his eyes caught sight of something beyond Lorelei. He paled, and his eyes widened. Lorelei frowned and spun round, to see a man with some kind of heavy rifle shouting at everyone to remain in their seats.

In one smooth motion, Lorelei unbuckled herself and leapt on top of the man. She dropped off almost immediately and, ducking down, launched herself back up into the man, knocking the rifle away from him. Lorelei frowned, wishing that they weren't in such close quarters so that she could roundhouse him. But they weren't, so she'd have to make do.

The man was facing her now, and was swinging. He was large, and he was undoubtedly strong, but his punches were slow. Of course, if one ever connected, she'd probably be down for the count. Lorelei ducked away from the punches, barely aware of the turmoil the fight was creating, and brought her hand back to slam the butt of her heel into the man's nose.

Then, without any warning whatsoever, something hard, heavy, and cold slammed into her back, driving her forward, and sending both of them sprawling. She rolled to get away, but she was too near the man, and one of his fists connected, sending her rolling off to her right. A roll that was quickly stopped by one of the seats.

Then there was nothing but an ever-increasing blackness that consumed her vision.

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The men were ready for the raid of the Verin Retreat. There had been news that some high-level targets were coming in on a flight to the Retreat, and that they were to be held as hostages until Gertal was released. But Eltan had never really believed that Gertal would be given up. Lefar Verin wasn't that kind of person. So he had personally handpicked fifty of the finest Blizzard Special Operations humans, and assigned them to the task of taking back their honorable leader.

At whatever cost was necessary.

Eltan had left the tactics up to the commander of the force, a man named Fretin, to decide, and had focused all of his energies on the hijacking attempt. Fretin, meanwhile, formulated and plotted and planned. He had at his disposal over two hundred Pokemon. Among them were two Alakazams, three Machamps, and five Houndooms; as well as ten snipers, five demolitionists, and three electronic ops men. Fretin was very proud of his elite forces.

He had everything ready. All he needed was the signal.

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Eltan smiled as he picked up a radio headset that one of the pilots had indicated he should take. The pilots had done a professional job, from lowering altitude to below radar range, to changing course. He was very impressed with them. Too bad they weren't on his side. Through the headset he had been given, he could speak with Lefar Verin, and thus negotiate the surrender of Gertal to his forces. True, he wasn't expecting a lot, but he had to distract the Verin Retreat enough to throw it into chaos because of the hijacking. Then, of course, he would signal his men on the ground the opportunity to begin the attack, and Gertal would be free.

"Lefar?" he asked, smiling as he looked down the barrel of the pistol at the pilot's head, "This is Team Blizzard. We know that you have Gertal in your custody. We are in custody of Flight 5671 from Saffron to the Verin Retreat. I am aiming my gun at one of the pilots right now."

He looked at the pilot, and from the reflection, saw the man grimace, before saying, "It's true, sir. I'm sorry."

A rather annoyed, yet still pompous voice came over the other end. "So am I. You know our policy, Blizzard. We don't deal with terrorists. And for the last six months that is just what you nomads have been. Terrorists. Sorry, but no deal."

Eltan smiled, things were going according to plan. "Lefar," he said, knowing he sounded like things weren't going the way that he wanted, "I'm warning you—"

"And I'm warning you." The resorter interrupted, "That is an international flight. Don't start a war that you can't win."

Eltan smiled, "I won't. This is your last chance, Lefar. In today's shipment of mail, there was a package from Blizzard Central You won't be able to trace it back there, so don't try. I know you have it. The tracking device in the package indicates it's in one of your labs. In the package is a diskette. The diskette details how to release Gertal. Go get the instructions, and follow them now."

The only thing that greeted Eltan was stony laughter. "You're insane, you Blizzard cretin. There's no way that we'll release Gertal. The man founded a terrorist organization. There's no way that we can let him out."

The most powerful man on the plane smiled, and replied, "I'm sorry too. Because of this, one of the passengers will die. I'll contact you in half an hour."

He unlocked the door and banged on the cockpit door three times. He had been assured by previous knocks on the door that the rest of the plane was secure, so he had no worries about that.

The door opened, and the hulking Letvarin entered, waving his sub-machine gun menacingly. "We have a prisoner to kill," Eltan said, cradling the headset in his hand, and grinning, "Do you have any suggestions?"

Letvarin nodded, wincing as his jaw popped. "Yes sir," he said, and a devilish gleam appeared in his eyes. Eltan smiled with him, and tossed the headset containing the protesting Nuschantian onto a chair as he exited the room.

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" The board is set. The pieces are moving."

--Gandalf, Lord of the Rings

at least, I think he said it. Ladies and gentlemen, this is the final chapter that you will have before things start to go downhill for our heroes. You thought that they were already going downhill?

you haven't seen anything yet.

Drop me a review, if you please, and you might be able to influence some future events...:D


	9. Let Slip the Dogs of War

Redemmo: Yes, the lawn...:D And yes, this is the first chapter that has the main thing I wrote this for: Mass warfare. But this...skirmish is nothing. :D And I never knew that about plane food.

Gaby: Thanks for the review. I didn't mean to make you scared to go up in planes, lol...

DISCLAIMER: The deadly gun in the hands of a Marksman/Snorlax-killing bullets sentence was paraphrased from Tom Clancy's Net Force. Yes, that is the Elite Steven.

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Fretin heard a slight buzzing sound over his headset, then another, then another. He smiled. Long short long. The signal to go. He glanced over at the Jynx that had been assigned to him and nodded.

The basic precepts of Pokemon warfare, as every military man knew, were not that different than normal battling without Pokemon, with one very major difference. Psychics. Psychis were what made battling with Pokemon so very, very tricky.

You always wanted at least one Psychic on your side to protect the minds of your troops, and to coordinate efforts, as well as provide a Barrier to protect your men from physical attack. As a general rule of thumb, you needed one Psychic for every seven hundred men. If you had more than one Psychic, you could engage in Psionic warfare. That was, of course, engaging the opposing "Guardian" Psychic, trying to disrupt the other Pokemon's coordination of the opposing army. The more powerful the Psychic, the better. Alakazams were ideal for this role, due to the fact that while they couldn't take very much physical damage before they fainted, they could take quite a beating mentally. Of course, if you had enough Alakazams to cover your men, you would want to utilize your OTHER Psychics in roles more fitting to their species.

Fretin had two Alakazams, five Hypnos, and more than thirty Jynx. This meant that he would have one Guardian Alakazam, and one offensive Alakazam. Hypnos, due to their ability to take a beating both mentally and physically, were ideal for the front lines. As the enemy approached or the enemy was being approached, they could use their Psybeams at long range, and their more powerful Psychics at close range before closing to point-blank range. Jynx, on the other hand, were more fragile, in both body and mind.

The four ranges used in Pokemon combat were generally Long-range, Medium-range, Short-range, and Point Blank-range. Each of the ranges corresponded with various attacks.

Long-range attacks, while small in number, were very powerful, and consisted mainly of the various beams—Solar Beam, Hyper Beam, Psybeam, Auroura Beam, Ice Beam, and other beams; well as cannon attacks such as Zap Cannon, Spike Cannon, and Octazooka; Tri-Attack; the most powerful elemental attacks such as Fire Blast, Hydro Pump, and Thunderbolt; and Pin Missile. Medium-range attacks consisted of attacks such as Swift; medium-powered elemental attacks such as Dragon Rage, Twineedle, Thunder, Flamewheel, Fire Spin, Nightmare, Psychic, Razor Leaf, Toxic, Psychic, and many others. Short-range attacks were generally attacks that damaged the opponent while not being directly touched by the attack. Point Blank attacks, of course, were such attacks such as Tackle, Fighting-type moves, Dark-type moves, and any moves that caused damage by direct contact of Pokemon. There was also a fifth type of move, the Status Alterers; such as healing types or status raising techniques. Of course, there were many other moves, such as Teleport.

Fretin looked down at the Verin Retreat. The four buildings formed a square, and in the center was a small building beside the retreat's airstrip. It was the main Verin Retreat base, and was where Gertal was most likely held. Anyone that wanted to reach the base, however, would first have to fight past the strongest defenses of any Resort in Nuschantz. This was, in fact, why the Verin Retreat had been chosen as the capitol of the country. No force had ever broken through the Retreat's walls. Until today.

Fretin narrowed his eyes. He knew that this was the tourist off season, and that meant that there wouldn't be as much of a defense, and would fight him to a stalemate if he were trying to take the resort over. However, he wasn't trying to take the resort over. He wanted Gertal.

He glanced to his left, and nodded. Immediately, the Alakazam that shielded his group from psionic detection raised its psionic defenses. Because of this, any Psychic inside the base would see his force as easily as a Snorlax would see a garbage dump from thirty yards away. In seconds, he knew, the base's own defenses would be raised, buth e had just enough time to launch one quick volley before it was too late.

The Psybeams, Solar Beams, Hyper Beams, Ice Beams, and Auroura Beams ripped into the nearest of the buildings of the Verin Retreat just before the bubble of a Barrier flickered into existence over the Retreat itself. Milliseconds later, a Barrier appeared over Fretin's men in time to block the scattered Psybeams that returned.

As per his orders, none of his men or Pokemon returned fire after the opening volley as the Guardian Alakazam linked their minds one by one. Fretin felt the touch of the Psychic, and, moments later, he was connected to every one of his men and Pokemon. Ordinarily, they would have been linked beforehand, but there was no way that he could have done so without revealing himself to the Resorters at the same time.

"All right," Fretin said out loud, and knew that every one of his men could hear him, "Bring up the RPGs." Rocket-Propelled Grenades, or "bazookas" as they had been nicknamed, were the weapon of choice for bringing down Barriers. Pokemon attacks simply didn't have the sheer power to focus on a certain point at a certain time as the RPGs did. Without Psionic assistance, RPGs would be almost useless. With Psionic assistance, they were one of the most deadly weapons there were. They were slow, but they were powerful.

Fretin watched as the scattered Psybeams began to from into a more cohesive pattern, and Ice Beams began to join them. Obviously, Lefar Verin was recovering, and getting his men ready. He had to know that a crushing blow was about to fall, but Fretin knew that he didn't know where it was from.

"Aim for the highest concentration of fire," he said, and mentally shifted his mental focus to the snipers, "Be ready," he said, feeling the Alakazam direct his thoughts to them.

Then, suddenly, over forty RPGs were fired, and the origins of their smoke trails immediately attracted the fire of the Ice Beams. Suddenly, a Flamethrower reached out and struck the shield. Then a Fire Blast. Fretin grinned. They were bringing out the big guns.

Seconds before the missiles struck, in a precisely concerted effort, Pokemon up and down his line fired. Psybeams, Ice Beams, Solar Beams Hyper Beams, as well as a stray Fire Blast and a Thunderbolt from somewhere were flung against the opposing Psychic's Defense Shield at the exact same moment the RPGs struck it. "Fire at will," Fretin said, and the beams struck out again, once again nearly in unity, and then haphazardly.

The opposing Barrier flickered for a moment, then dropped completely. The withering barrage laid waste to the two closest buildings, and the return fire declined, then petered out altogether. Fretin frowned. "Cease Fire," he said. Something wasn't right. This was too easy.

And then he realized exactly what was happening. Somehow, the Resorters had discovered his second task force. He only had thirty-five men at his position. They were meant to be a diversionary tactic, to lure out the main bulk of the Verin Retreat's men. Then, when the battle was fully joined, his second force would sweep in from the opposite direction, and take Gertal.

There was no way that that Barrier had been put up by an Alakazam. It was definitely the work of Jynx. Many Jynx working in tandem, most assuredly, but Jynx nonetheless. That meant that the resorts main force wasn't inside the Retreat, but was in the mountains surrounding the Retreat. Fretin swallowed, and felt his skin grow cold. "Jynx, scan for a Psionic blocking field." He said.

If Psychics worked hard enough, they could find Psychics that were preventing themselves and others from being seen. But it took a lot more work to find them than it did to make the field. The search lasted only a second, but it seemed to take an eternity. And then there it was. "Pincer!" Fretin yelled, "Darks and Fighters to the rear!" He whirled around, searching the top of the hill for the force that would appear there in seconds, "We're being flanked! Down into the Retreat, now!"

Then there was confusion in his ranks as the Drak types and Fighting types moved to the rear to protect the retreat/charge, and the humans and other more fragile Pokemon began their march down to the Retreat. "Contact the Secondary Force," He said, grateful for the link that the Alakazam provided to all of his men, "Activate them, and have them meet us in the Retreat." He glanced over his shoulder, and there he saw them. The first ranks of the Verin Retreat's finest. Their silver and blue uniforms shone in the sun, and the ranks of men and Pokemon stood menacingly. And then the first Fire Blast hit the center of a bunched formation, and men flew everywhere. Fretin whipped his head around to see his men charging down the hill that they had been hiding behind, and the Pokemon that had been assigned to them firing at the Retreat's men. Within seconds, both forces had their Barriers up, but the Retreaters had been confused for a few critical seconds.

Seconds which Fretin and his men and Pokemon used to charge down into the Retreat. "Dark, Fighting, begin pulling back," he said, pulling out his assault rifle, "Snipers, do your jobs." He said. The snipers weren't in his formation at all. He had considered it, but thankfully had decided against it. Now, they could take potshots at the Verin forces. Not that that would do a lot of good, but every little bit helped.

As Fretin ran down with his men into the Retreat, and watched the short-range attacks flying every which way, he wondered how long it would take Lefar to bring his equines into the battle. Once he did that, the battle would be largely over.

Fretin caught a mental warning and threw himself behind a rock, and an Ice Beam barely missed him. He popped up over the top of the rock and let loose three short bursts. He saw the Pokemon fall to the ground, and he continued his run into the Retreat. Without the Fighting and Dark types, the assault was much more difficult, but the fighting and dark types on the opposite side of the base were doing an admirable job of forcing the Verins back.

Fretinn knew that now his men would be a diversion that kept the Retreaters at bay long enough so the Secondary Force could get Gertal. His men were already at the top of the base. He raised his rifle again and fired several more bursts. He glanced behind him, and saw that the Verin charge was already underway.

Suddenly, something around him changed, and he heard one of his men saying that the field that had prevented their teleportation directly to Gertal was down. Several Psychics immediately teleported down to the prison, and spirited their leader away. Fretin grinned, and called for the retreat. It was a great day for Nuschantz. Team Blizzard had their leader once more, and soon, Nuschantz would be theirs.

Fretin began pulling away from the Retreat, and watched as the Psychics began teleporting his men away, and knew that he would be among the last to leave the battleground. He had chosen the honor, and he would serve it. He wouldn't have his men stay behind to fight just so that he could get away. What kind of general would he be then?

No, he would be the very last person to be teleported away. If he died, then he died defending Team Blizzard, not the other way around.

All around him his men were disappearing, but they were also dying much faster. Without their comrades to protect them, the Verinners were moving that much more easily through their ranks. He knew that retreating in this fashion would have a higher casualty rate, but he didn't see any other choice. The Base was hidden, and it needed to remain hidden.

This was the only way to get back there without giving away the base's location.

Fretin was finally away from the retreat, and a good distance up a hill. He dove in among a pile of rocks, and began firing his rifle nonstop at the approaching force of Retreaters. By now, there was nearly no one left on the battlefield BUT Lefar's men. He swept his rifle back and forth, and flinched slightly as attacks of all shapes and sizes exploded all around him, but he wouldn't stop firing until he was away from the battle.

He saw a horse rushing for him, and he shifted his aim. The horse stumbled and fell, but the rider leaped from his horse to cover behind a fallen rocks, and fired at Fretin. Fretin cursed and ducked down behind the rock, knowing that within seconds, his position would be overrun and he would be dead.

He braced himself for one last surge before he died, and suddenly felt the world around him melting away. He relaxed as the familiar sensations of the Teleport technique enveloped him. He was safe. He was away. He had won.

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Eltan looked down at the unconscious girl, then at the Alakazam that had gotten onto the plane in a Pokeball along with about thirty other Pokemon and the heavy weapons down in the cargo hold. The Alakazam had been keeping the unconscious girl unconscious simply because she had proven herself to be quite a fighter. If there were just three of her, and they had all done what she had done, Eltan doubted that he would have been able to take over the plane.

He pulled out his pistol and looked at it. It was a family heirloom. It had a trigger, a barrel, a worn grip, a revolving case that supplied up to six bullets to the barrel, and the arming device. He had once heard it called a "six shooter,' but he just called it "my gun." Kantans and Johtans failed to realize that even his small gun was more deadly in the hands of an expert marksman than an entire magazine of Snorlax-killing bullets in the hands of a novice. He pulled the hammer back and took several steps back from the girl. "Wake her up," he said quietly, aiming the gun directly at her head.

With this girl, he didn't exactly trust the Alakazam to keep the girl in one place. It was, after all, better safe than sorry. The Alakazam slowly began to stimulate the neurons in the young woman's brain, and suddenly Lorelei was awake. She lurched towards him, but Eltan was able to keep from reflexively pulling the trigger. He smiled, "Well, Lorelei Belle Winters," he said, "I've told Lefar Verin that I'm going to kill someone because he refused to let our leader go, and, since you gave us so much trouble, I've chosen you."

Lorelei glared at him. "What, you going to shoot me?" she demanded, staring at him.

Eltan smiled. "Sorry," he grinned at her. "But that won't show our resolve. We're willing to do anything to get what we want. And that means that you're going to die." He nodded to the Alakazam and lowered his gun. Instantly, a translucent barrier appeared between the two.

Lorelei frowned. "What are you going to do?" she asked, "Deprive me of air?"

Eltan smiled faintly. "Not quite." He said, "you'll have plenty of it. In fact, that's all you'll have."

Lorelei frowned, trying to decipher what he had said. Suddenly, the door behind her swung open, and she was sucked out of the plane, and into the open air. Eltan smiled. It was done. "Close the door," he said quietly. "And lower the Barrier. I need to get to the cockpit."

Lorelei was falling. She was going to die, she knew. "You'll have lots of air," she mimicked the Blizzard as she watched the ground rushing up to meet her. Faster and faster it came. And all she could think of was how stupid the Blizzard was. "There were so many more chilling things to say," she muttered to herself, feeling her lips pulling back as she continued to accelerate. "Why couldn't he have picked something that would have sounded scarier?"

She consoled herself by knowing that she'd make a spectacular landing. Snow flying everywhere, a large crater…She felt giddy. This was all that was left to her, so she might as well do it to the best of her ability. She curled herself into a ball, and felt herself accelerate even faster. She began to roll, and she grinned. She'd make the best landing there ever was.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a flash of something silver, she turned her head, but either it was already gone, or she was starting to roll on all three axes now. She put the streak out of her mind, and watched as the ground rushed up to meet her. Any second now, and all she'd be was a big smear on the ground.

That made a GREAT landing. Too bad no one would be there to see it.

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Bugsy stared up at the Blizzard, stunned. He hadn't been close enough to hear the words that the Blizzard and Lorelei shared, but he had seen her ejected from the plane, and knew that there was no way that she would be able to survive. It made him feel sick. It made him want to rush the Blizzard too, but the time for that was past. The Blizzards were now firmly in control of the plane, and any attack on them now would be suicide.

He was pretty sure that there would be no way out of this for him. He glowered at the hulking man who'd knocked Lorelei unconscious, and the man, carrying a very impressive gun, grinned back at him. The man was missing several teeth, and Bugsy looked away.

There was a way out of any situation, he knew. He just had to find the way out of this one. One of his most valuable allies was gone, with the money he'd won off of her, he remembered with a wry smile. Sure, he had his university friends, but they weren't really fighters. Neither was he, without his Pokemon. And they'd been confiscated by the Jynx that the Blizzards had gotten from somewhere. Everyone's Pokemon had been.

He'd heard rumors that the Pokemon that had been released by trainers in the Business class had been heartlessly gunned down before they could attack anything, and Bugsy was glad that he'd decided not to release his Pokemon.

Bugsy swallowed. He didn't see any way out of this one. In fact, he couldn't even see where they were. Several of the Psychics on the plane were apparently holding the window shades down, and they had also relieved everyone of any tracking device that could show their location.

He sighed and leaned his back against the back of his seat, and felt hopelessness pervade his senses. There was nothing he could do right now. Maybe later would be the time for action, but not yet.

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Eltan put the headset back on, and nodded to the Machamp and the Abra that stood guard over the pilots. Yes, it made the cockpit cramped, but it was the best use of resources. The Machamp could face the door and cover it with two pistols in his top two hands, and still keep the pilots cooperating with his lower two arms, thanks to the Abra keeping mental tabs on the pilots and telling the Machamp what to do.

Eltan smiled and turned back to the radio, for once relieved that he didn't have to worry about anyone trying to kill him. "Lefar Verin," he said, "This is Team Blizzard aboard Flight 5671 from Saffron City to your Retreat, now redirected. I have killed one hostage. I believe that you may recognize it. Lorelei Belle Winters? Now, can I have Gertal?"

Eltan waited for a minute. It would probably take Lefar a while to get to the communications array, if Fretin had carried out his attack on schedule. He repeated his message, and waited. This time, Lefar came back to him. "You know the answer to that," the resorter responded, sounding mad enough to spit nails. "Your men have attacked my resort, and they took him. My forces drove them off and forced them to use a teleportation retreat. They took heavy losses."

Eltan chuckled, "Lefar, Lefar…" he shook his head, "They were under orders to utilize a Teleportation retreat. You didn't force them into anything. And they all volunteered. They all expected to die. They were willing to die to retrieve our glorious leader. That we managed to inflict damage upon you is simply a bonus."

Lefar's voice came back, and the tone was deadly serious, "Blizzard, with that attack, you have sealed your doom. I've asked for help from a great deal of countries, and many have already said that they will stand with us. The Indigo League Elite Four have agreed to help us, as has the Johto League. The Altans are sending their elite forces to help us, and Silph Corporation is sending its men to assist us. You are doomed."

Eltan smiled faintly, and wished that Lefar could see his smirking face, "Do you really think I hadn't considered that? We've got help. Your underestimating us will be your doom."

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Bruno watched the Johto News Network coverage of the rapidly unfolding events happening in the tourist trap of a country that was known as Nuschantz. He could only stare at the devastation that Team Blizzard had caused in their attack on the Verin Retreat. They had all but razed one building, leaving it hanging, and looking like it would collapse at any moment; and had demolished an entire half of another. The other two were untouched from the third floor up to the top of the building at the twentieth floor, but had heavy damage on the bottom two floors.

He shook his head, and realized that he was among a knot of trainers gawking at the television in Olivine City's Pokemon Center. "Someone has to go over there and stop them," he heard someone say, and general murmurs of agreement spread throughout the crowd.

His eyes glittered. "I can take 'em all on!" he boasted, "If any of you want to help me, then you can follow me to Goldenrod. We'll fly from there!" a cheer rose up from the crowd, and Bruno grinned. He would take on the Blizzard murderers. Whoever got in his way would be dead.

He was pretty popular, and he was sure that he could get a good-sized force together to go challenge the—"This just in," the reporter on the television said, catching everyone's attention. "It appears that the hijacked plane we told you about earlier has—" the woman stopped, and stared at the piece of paper that had been put in front of her. She swallowed. "Ladies and gentlemen, they've killed one of their hostages. A young woman who has dropped out of the public eye in recent years. Her name is Lorelei Belle Winters. We'll continue to—" whatever she would say next was drowned out by an angry roar that filled the Pokemon Center.

Bruno stared at the screen. He didn't doubt that it was true. He just couldn't believe that it had happened. The girl that had beaten him in the Allnian National Tournament all those years ago was dead. His eyes narrowed. He'd been looking forward to a rematch. He'd kill whoever killed her.

That was his guarantee.

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Steven glared at the television screen as he threw clothes into his suitcase. His Aggron watched him from the door. He had just announced that he was shutting down his Blackthorne City gym, and was going to Nuschantz to help defend the resorters from Team Blizzard. It had been three hours since he had heard about the death of the girl, and he knew that he had to stop them. From the news reports, it had sounded as if this was something the Nuschantians wouldn't be able to handle on their own. His Gym trainers had received the news very well, and had in turn recruited many trainers that were passing through or trainers that lived in Blackthorne. He'd received responses from the Eevee sisters in Ecruteak that they'd help him, and that they were on their way to the Blackthorne airport.

He shook his head. The response had been overwhelming. Everyone was willing to help him. Even some beginner trainers had volunteered. He'd refused to let them go, however, in favor of only letting the more experienced trainers come.

He'd left a young woman named Clair in charge of the defense of Blackthorne, in case any wild Pokemon decided to attack Blackthorne or trainers outside of Blackthorne in the absence of so many powerful trainers. Even though she specialized in dragon types, and he in Steel types, he was confident that she'd do a good job, though she seemed to be overly aggressive in her battles.

He closed the suitcase and turned to the door. "Well, Aggron," he said, "This is it. You ready to go to war?" he asked, already knowing the answer.

His Pokemon grinned and roared out an affirmative.

Steven smiled. "All right then, let's go." He said, hurrying out the door towards the airport where nearly thirty trainers waited for him. He knew that all over the country, and in Kanto and Hoenn, the scene was being repeated. Gym Leaders and trainers alike had pledged their support to the Nuschantians.

He knew that before the conflict was over, more than two hundred trainers from Johto alone would descend upon the frozen country. There was no way that the Blizzards would win any way that they fought. Sheer numbers would defeat them, if nothing else.

There was simply no way that they could have a force that could best both native Nuschantian armies and the forces that were coming in from all over the world.

Or was there, Steven wondered. He doubted the leaders of Team Blizzard were stupid, and they surely must have taken this very thing into consideration.

With an uneasy stomach, Steven wondered how exactly the Blizzards were planning on countering their coming. There was no way that they'd be able to hijack any more planes going into the country, there would be simply too many trainers going into the country.

What, then, were the Blizzards going to do?

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heh...it has begun...

On the advice of Redemmo:

Be afraid, be VERY afraid!


	10. Outside Interference

Redemmo: Um, yeah the Violet thing was just a skirmish. True, it had one of the most powerful legendaries ever in it (later on in this fic, you'll find out that Drago is, well...nah, I won't spoil it. :D), but it still only had about 80-90 people max. No, Lance is not in this, neither is Karen, Koga (he's still a gym leader, remember?), Phoebe, or Glacia. Lance, possibly Koga, and MAYBE Karen will be in a spin-off of this. Karen is a very big maybe.

heh...I just used this chapter to look back on to finish Chapter 13...:D

don't worry, you'll get there soon enough.

oh yeah, and Agatha's in this...well, she's mentioned, but so far, she hasn't had a part.

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Giovanni looked out over his men. Over five hundred of the best trainers in Kanto were assembled inside the main dining area of the Hudson Haven, and he was their General. As the Indigo League Champion, he was expected to lead his men into combat and bring them out alive.

He was among the oldest of the trainers that had come to taste the field of battle, and, at forty-three, was the only one that had any actually viable military experience. He had studied for nearly a decade at the Altan Institute for Martial Doctrine, and had served an additional five years in the Altan Army. It had been three years since he had left the Altans, and returned to Kanto.

Since he had returned to his mother country, he had risen swiftly through the ranks, and had most recently become champion of the country. The previous Champion had been driving the League into the ground, as the Reps, or the Representative Assembly of Kanto, could attest. Since he had defeated the cynical old man that had been known as Blaine just over five months before, he had carefully and efficiently pulled the nation's economy out of its nose-dive by sanctioning the construction of a "Safari Zone" in Fuschia City, where endangered Pokemon could flee to for sanctuary, and trainers could attempt to capture the non-endangered Pokemon using only their wits.

Additionally, he had approved the building of a massive colosseum on the Indigo Plateau, to replace the old, rickety colosseum that had become more of a hazard than a held, and a massive burst of advertisement for the Indigo League. He was sure, that within five years, Kanto would be the envy of the world.

But first, he would have to win this war. He knew that within several days, over three thousand trainers from all over the world would be stationed here, at the third-largest retreat in Nuschantz. However, he also knew that they would very likely lose to even five hundred Blizzards without the proper training. If he had had a choice, he would have wanted months to prepare the men and women for combat. As it was, he didn't have that luxury, and he would have to settle for a shorter version of training. If what he had in mind actually worked, it would take no more than a week and a half. Even then, he wouldn't have his men join in combat against the Blizzards unless they had a very clear margin of victory.

He shook his head and turned back to his carefully selected command staff. They were among the most able-bodied and experienced fighting men and women in all of Kanto. A young man by the name of Tyberius Surge had demanded to be a part of the cabal, but Giovanni had refused, saying that the man had no military experience, and, as such, could not be counted on for tactically wise solutions to difficult problems.

He had at the table a pair of twins by the name of Butch and Cassidy Sundance, a particularly formidable pair of teens with good heads on their shoulders and Pokemon on their belts; the former Indigo League Champion, Blaine; and an elderly woman by the name of Agatha Fraley, who, in prior battles with her, had proven to be a formidable warrior and a superior tactician. Together, he was sure, he'd be able to give the Blizzards a run for their money. As long as the relativistically independent Kantan trainers learned to cooperate, and not charge around the battlefield operating on their own. If that happened, there would be no way that any sort of cohesive battle plan would be able to be established, and there would be no way to win the war.

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The figure shook his head and put it into his hands, all of which were metaphorical, of course. The future was changed. Drastically changed. The Girl would now not become the Elite that she was supposed to be. The future was irreparably changed.

He could take care of the other temporal incursions, but her present circumstance wasn't a temporal incursion. It was supposed to happen. But she wasn't supposed to be there. He had wanted to try to fix the meddling in the timeline, but the Council had voted unanimously against him. They had said that any further temporal adjustments could seriously damage the timeline.

So they had forbade him from entering the realm of the Physical Ones. They were fools. They didn't see the imminent danger that was approaching. Only he could. He was the most far-sighted of the council, and he knew what awaited them in just a short stretch of time, unless it could be prevented.

But he had been forbidden from altering the timeline. Or, rather, altering the timeline by entering the Physical Realm. But there were other possibilities, he realized, that could be exploited that did not involve entering the Physical Realm. And he needed to do it as soon as he could.

The metaphorical figure drew in a breath, and began working. He just hoped that he could reach the person he wanted in time.

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Lorelei looked around the room. It was odd. It was a silvery affair, and was perfectly cubical. There seemed to be, except for the wall directly in front of her, at the same time, a wall not that far away in every direction, yet at the same time, no end of the room in sight.

She frowned and walked around the room, not quite sure how she had gotten here. The last thing that she remembered was that she had been falling. She had looked to the side, and then—nothing.

She glanced around the room, taking stock of herself. She was wearing the same clothes that she had on when she had been falling, but it seemed different somehow. Lighter, maybe.

She tapped the wall experimentally, but it was solid. Sort of. She wasn't sure exactly how to explain it, but it felt slightly pliable.

She glared at the walls and struck them with her fist. For some reason, she felt no pain. Muttering to herself, she slammed her right foot into the wall. Once again she didn't feel anything. She sighed and slumped against the wall. There was nothing she could do against it, and it wasn't the best idea to be running away from wherever she was. The wall at her back felt slightly cold and definitely metallic, but was otherwise not very noteworthy.

She closed her eyes and leaned against the wall. Through her eyelids, she saw—or felt?—a flash of silverfish light. When she opened her eyes, she was somewhere else completely. Instead of the silver room, she was in a small cottage. A quick glance around showed her that this was definitely Tintian architecture. It was old-fashioned, too. In one corner was an actual wood burning stove. Above the door, a bow hung, and on either side of the door, a sword hung, its tip pointing skyward.

In the middle of the rather rustic cabin sat a young man. He was probably no more than twenty-three, and had loose, brown clothes that looked like he'd made them himself. About a hundred years or more in the past. Lorelei stood up cautiously, "What do you want?" she asked cautiously.

The young man held out a hand. "Lorelei," he said, "I know that this is a little hard to take in. I want to assure you that I don't mean you any harm." He gestured at one of two seats in the room, both rustic-looking and made out of wood, on the other side of a rough wooden table from him.

Lorelei's eyes narrowed. "I'd prefer to stand, thank you." She snapped, not moving a muscle except, of course, for those that moved involuntarily or allowed her to speak.

The man sighed and shook his head, "Look," he said, "I'm not here to hurt you. I'm here to help you. If I could have helped you sooner, I would have, but things aren't that simple. You'd be dead by now if it weren't for me, you know."

Lorelei frowned, "What are you talking about?"

The man grinned, "Tell you what. You sit down, we talk, and I'll tell you. Deal?" he asked.

Lorelei growled from deep in her throat. "Fine." She muttered, and slunk over to the seat and plopped down, but not before checking for booby traps. "Now talk!" she demanded, pounding the table with one fist. "I would think it would be simple to talk to me. Just walk out the door and come visit me. Of course, I probably wouldn't have talked to you, but that's not the point."

The man sighed. "Look, I know you think that you're still on Earth, but you're not. You're nowhere in your Universe, all right? This is-well, the easiest way to explain it to you would be to say that it's another Dimension, where your physical attributes don't matter. You can look like whatever you want. Be almost whatever you want. But you, your personality, the thing inside you that is you-that lives here, and you can never change what that's like. Well," he conceded with a grin. "Not without a lot of effort, anyway. Unless you people have a lot more will power than I did back when I was a Physical."

Lorelei frowned. "This is-" she glanced around, slightly relaxing. "This isn't on Earth?" she asked. The man shook his head. "And you can really-" she cut herself off as the man suddenly turned into a Charizard, then a Togepi, a Growlithe, and a Sudowoodo, before returning to his original appearance.

He raised an eyebrow at her. "What does that tell you?" he asked her.

Lorelei shook her head. "That I'm dreaming?" she said in a confused tone.

The man laughed. "It's all right, Lorelei, you're not dreaming. You're in a coma. It's the best time, though, for me to contact you." Lorelei frowned, and opened her mouth to say something, but the man cut her off. "I know who you are, but you don't know who I am. I'll get to that in a second, but first, you just need to listen."

Lorelei nodded feebly. This was too much. She was having an information overload. Things were coming at her too hard and too fast. This was either a very vivid dream, or it was a nightmarish reality. Suddenly, nothing made sense.

"There have been people traveling from another time period back to yours to try and change history to benefit them. I've stopped many of them, but I haven't been able to stop them all. Unfortunately, the timeline is beyond repair, and I don't think you'll ever be the Dark Elite of the Kanto Elite Four like you were supposed to be."

Lorelei's head shot up. "Huh?" she demanded. "I hate dark types. Almost as much as fire types. They're just so stupid."

The man smiled. "Then why did you choose a Sneasel?"

Lorelei rolled her eyes. "It was the only Ice type Companion that was still available back when I wanted to start out in Alto, and I was too impatient to wait three weeks until the next companion would be available. If there had been any other ice type, I would have chosen it." The man raised an eyebrow, but Lorelei charged on. "This is getting really weird." She got up and began stalking around the small room. "First you tell me that some people are messing up time travel, next you tell me that I'm supposed to be in the Elite Four, Master of a type that I hate. What's next? Are you the Tintian Gerahid?" she demanded.

The man smiled, and shrugged. "Actually," he said, "I am."

Lorelei rolled her eyes. "Right. You're the guy that in just a few short years turned the tide of an Engaran War. Who, when he was only fourteen or whatever had commanded his first victory? Who is the second-most respected human in Tintian History?" she laughed harshly. "Sorry, but I don't believe you. Gerahid died when he was twenty-three. And that was two hundred years ago."

The Gerahid impostor smiled. "Did he really?" he said quietly. "What's that expression that the Tintians are always throwing about? Oh, yes. 'Titans never die'?"

Lorelei twisted her lip. "Look, if you don't want to tell me, you don't have to. Just get me back to where I was, and I'll be quite happy. I've got to go help Bugsy. Since I'm still alive, that still means that I can help him out."

The man stood up and shook his head. "Lorelei, you've been in the coma for a week. Bugsy's in a Blizzard prison in their secret, ultra-secure base deep in the Nuschantian Mountain Range. I'm not at liberty to tell you exactly where it was, but even if I did, you'd be faced with literally millions of Pokémon and thousands of Blizzards to defeat before you got to him. It's hopeless."

Lorelei narrowed her eyes, "I love a good challenge, but I wasn't planning on going right away. I've got myself a Legendary Bird to find. After I get my Sneasel healed, I'll be finding Bugsy, and Allnian help anyone who gets in my way." She suddenly realized what she had just said, and grinned., "As long as I get to Allnian first."

The Gerahid impersonator sighed, "All right," he said quietly, "But just be sure that you find Allnian and get your Sneasel healed. If you don't, then even the Titans won't be enough to save the world." The man raised his hands and a silver glow surrounded them. "Don't let anything stop you."

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Bugsy sat in his cell in the corner. It was where he had consigned himself to after the first several days, and nobody paid much attention to him. He was the last to get food, but that was all right. He needed the time to think.

He had noticed that the Blizzards had used a rare type of Pokeball, called a Wipe Ball, so-called because the Pokemon inside the ball would imprint itself ONLY to the person that caught it, and not listen to anyone else.

That was the bad news.

The good news was that Bugsy had checked up on the Blizzards before he had come, and learned that they used an Ice type that was very stupid, yet very powerful. If his theory was correct, its stupidity could prove to be the decisive factor in their escape. If everything went according to plan.

From what he'd heard about Blizzards, the Mountain Goats were a standard issue, so no matter when they launched their jail break attempt, they SHOULD be able to get a Pokemon to use.

But not yet…

More people were being brought in every day. For what, Bugsy wasn't sure, but all he knew was that he had to get out.

But he had to be patient.

He needed more people for the operation to have any chance of success.

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It was a quiet day at the Prito Ski Resort. The pet Moyferar were frolicking out in the snow in front of the house, the defensive Mightyena lay on the front porch, where they would remain for the rest of the day, barring any emergency on the slopes or Blizzard attack. It was the tourist off-season, so there weren't many people around except, of course, for the hired hands the Pritos had commissioned to help with some maintenance. Of course, there were still a few tourists around, but the ski lifts weren't operating.

The Prito Resort was a smaller resort than most. One of nearly a hundred scattered around the country, the Prito Resort was the newest resort in the country, and one of the fastest growing as well. But it still wasn't as large as the next largest resort. However, most analysts predicted that within five years, it would be larger than twenty percent of every resort in Nuschantz.

The Ski Lodge stood proudly in front of the icy field that served a dual purpose as the ice skating rink and the runway for the bush planes that ferried tourists and supplies to and from the resort. The next plane wasn't expected for several hours, though, and so no one was outside.

The Resort was, actually, one of the most luxurious of the smaller resorts. The interior of the resort was covered in wood paneling, expensive paintings and tapestries, and the windows were made of stained glass. Through the hallways a young boy crept, trying to remain inconspicuous.

He peered around the corner, and at the girl lying on the bed. He thought that she was the most beautiful thing that he had ever seen. She was short, but her black hair with that blond streak running through the back made her look so beautiful. And that golden bracelet that she had on her right wrist. The one with the etching of Drago on it. She had heard that something like it had attacked Johto, but he couldn't believe it. There were people that watched Drago's cave constantly, and they would notify all of Nuschantz if it ever left its cave. It had not. That could only mean that, well, something else was going on.

Out in the corridor, he could hear someone stomping up the stairs. Quickly, he ran out of the room, and made sure to shut the door behind himself.

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Lorelei heard the sound of a door closing, and opened her eyes. She frowned. The discussion in the cabin seemed almost like a dream. Was it a dream? She couldn't be sure. She glanced around the lush room. There was a canopy over the bed, and a painting of a snow-covered mountain hung on one of the walls. She checked to make sure that she was dressed, and threw the covers aside. Crossing to the window, she looked outside, and realized that somehow, she'd made it to Nuschantz. But how was that possible?

She suddenly felt dizzy, and raised a hand to her head. She thought she caught a flash of gold out of the corner of her eye, and looked at her wrist. There was a bracelet that hadn't been there before. It had the outline of—she felt the blood draining from her face. She recognized the shape. It was the same dragon that had attacked Violet City.

She felt a little stiff. She went through one of her self-defense drills, and realized that she was even stiffer than she had thought. She shook her head and staggered through the door. From one end of a lavishly decorated hall, she could hear singing. She walked down the corridor and pushed open the massive, ornately carved double door.

Inside, across the room, a massive fire roared, and about thirty people were sitting around it, singing and roasting marshmallows. Off to one side was a buffet table, and Lorelei suddenly realized that she was extremely hungry. She darted through the doors without another thought and ran to the buffet and began stuffing things in her mouth, oblivious to everything else.

The next thing she could remember, after gorging herself, were people cheering and patting her on the back. She couldn't recall afterwards exactly how long she was eating before she came back to herself, but she was pretty sure it was at least five minutes

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Eltan paced the room, waiting nervously for his commander to enter the room. The Verin Retreat had given up the soldiers, albeit involuntarily. Blizzard Intelligence had shoed that they were moving a large strike team into position to try to take his plane, and had left the Retreat with a minimal guard. Blizzard operatives had stormed the Retreat, released the prisoners, and gotten away with minimal injuries.

Eltan leaned heavily on the desk, and smiled, remembering the relief he'd felt when he learned that he no longer had to threaten to kill hostages. Only the girl had been killed, and he was sorry that he had to do it, but he had had no choice. The so-called government of Nuschantz needed a serious overhaul, and the leaders of the various retreats around the country showed that they had no intention of bringing one about.

The Team Blizzard movement had started with a few disgruntled men from various retreats around the country, led by a man called Gertal, who held a conference that attempted to change the way things were run in Nuschantz, but the leaders of the family retreats refused to listen to them.

For fifteen years, Gertal and his men tried unsuccessfully to institute a series of reforms, but was rebuffed each time. With each attempt, however, the number of his followers grew. Then Gertal had realized that it was impossible to instate reforms while the current leadership was in power, and that it was impossible to oust them from their positions.

So he had gone into the mountains for ten years, and built part of the base that he was standing in today. Then he had emerged, and recruited hundreds of men and women to his cause, as well as thousands of Pokemon. That had been three years ago. The leadership of Nuschantz still refused to listen to them, so now, they were forced to take militial action. None of the Blizzards liked it, but they all knew it had to be done, for the sake of the country.

The hijacking of the plane had become necessary when Gertal had been captured on the last of his recruitment tours, and the Verin family, the most powerful retreat in Nuschantz, had refused to release him. Eltan was relieved that there had been no further loss of life.

But now, the Blizzards would plan an offensive against the twelve Nuschantian Retreats. If they planned it well, it would be a relatively bloodless coup. If they planned badly…thousands of humans and Pokemon would die. None of the Blizzards wanted that.

Eltan was brought out of his revery by the sound of a door opening. He snapped to attention in his crisp, dark-blue uniform, and felt a swell of pride as Gertal himself stepped through the doorway. "I am told," he said in his low, gravelly voice, "That I have you to thank for lowering the Verin Retreat's defenses and teleporting me here."

Eltan nodded eagerly, "Yes sir, I did. I hope that you will be proud of me."

Gertal's eyes narrowed. "I did not know how you managed to do it before I got back here, Eltan. When I had left you in charge, I hadn't thought you'd go this far. With your single action, you have brought us down to the level of the Rockets! Now people will view us as criminals. You killed in cold blood, Eltan, to free me from prison, and you would have killed more. You hijacked a plane. That is not what I want people to remember when they look back on history and write about us."

Eltan felt the sting of the words, and hung his head. "I am sorry, sir. I did what I thought was best."

He felt Gertal's hands on his shoulders. "But we cannot change the past. Perhaps, however, in the future, we may be able to atone for what you have done. But it will take time to regain the people's trust. And until we do, we must stop our plans for political reform. The people have to want us to change things. If we go now, they will see us as carrying out a vendetta. Treat the hostages for any injuries they may have, and send them to the Verin Retreat." He turned to walk away, then turned back to Eltan, "But I would like to speak with them, before they return."

Eltan nodded, and swiped at the holographic controls for the screen in front of himself. Now, the Blizzards could be freed up to their other main goal. A goal that Eltan had worked for his entire life.

What would it be like, he wondered, to have the power to live forever? If his plans worked, it would be within his grasp. But he would not give up the strikes that were planned against Nuschantz. He had worked far too hard to give up now. And the Blizzards would win.

Or die trying.

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Lorelei stared up at the stars outside the Prito Ski Resort, and hugged herself. Would she ever be able to start her journey? Would she ever be able to have a Pokemon that didn't get some kind of fatal or nearly fatal injury within twenty-four hours of her getting it for her journey?

She looked down at her feet and shoved the snow around. Maybe it was her. Maybe she wasn't meant to be a trainer. Maybe, she should just quit now, and forget about Allnian.

From out of the corner of her left eye, she caught a movement, and she turned, slowly. She didn't care if it was someone that wanted to attack her anymore. She just didn't care anymore. How could she? She's failed Bugsy. She'd failed Sneasel. She'd failed her brother. She'd failed Delibird, and had gotten it killed. But most of all, she'd failed herself.

She saw the young boy, Lukas Prito, she recalled, and he approached her shyly. "Hi," he said.

"Hi," Lorelei said, turning away from him and looking back up at the stars, trying to keep from crying. The stars were so much brighter here. So much more vivid.

"Do you have any Pokemon?" the boy asked. Somewhere in the back of her mind, a minor surge of annoyance bubbled up, but it never came to the fore.

Lorelei considered the question, and said, "Yes, but it can't battle. It's far too injured." Lorelei said quietly. "And I have to find…" she trailed off.

"Was it a Sneasel?" the boy's voice interrupted her thoughts, and she shook her head. Was she ever this annoying? "Because if it is, we just got a matter to matter transmission from a place called Cherrygrove City in Johto with a Sneasel. Said that you needed it."

Lorelei shook her head. "Not unless I can find Allnian," she said quietly. "She's the only one that can help me now."

"I know where Allnian lives!" came the cheery voice of the nine-year old, "I can take you there!"

"I don't have any Pokemon that are up to it," Lorelei said, turning to face the boy. For the first time since the plane, a dim flicker of hope stirred within her.

"That doesn't matter," the boy said, and produced a Pokeball, "Here," he said, "Take my Smoochum!" he handed the orb to Lorelei, who took it carefully.

She eyed it, then shook her head, "I can't," she said, "Whenever I have Pokemon, bad things always happen to them. I don't want anything to happen to it." She held the ball out, "Here," she said, "You take it back."

Lukas frowned, "In Nuschantz," he said quietly, "When you're given a gift, it's an insult to refuse."

Lorelei sighed, "Fine," she said, "I'll keep it. But we're going out after Allnian in two days, you got it?"

Lukas grinned. "Two days," he cried, and ran back into the lodge.

Lorelei shook her head and looked back up to the stars. What had she gotten herself into this time?

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heh...

if you thought that the plot is twisty now, you ain't seen nothin' yet...:D

I still have to deal with how Lorelei is still alive, Giovanni, Eltan/Gertal, and, oh yeah. Allnian.

:D

Drop me a review, will you, please?


	11. Lost in Snow

Well, thanks for the reviews guys! just two more chapters until I release a Bugsy spin-off onto (have I mentioned it before here?)

Gaby: yeah, I had Blaine be the championn because, well, he's old! he was probably champion some time, right:D and yerah, every chapter'll be about this length.

Redemmo: yeah, things are starting to accelerate, and no, Will will NOT appear in this fic. Maybe in the Bugsy spin-off, though. However, there may be some Team MAgma and Aqua stuff in here...who are the leaders of the teams in R/S/E, do you or anyone else know?

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Falkner stared at the gun. Maybe he should just end it all now. That would be all that it took. His hometown, of which he was the unofficial mayor, was in ruins, and struggling to survive, but more and more people were leaving each day. He wondered if there was any hope left for his town.

He stared at the gun on the table in front of him. It would be so easy. Just pick it up, put it to his head, and pull the trigger. He sighed and glanced around his gym. Even it hadn't escaped the battle unscathed. The arena's roof had collapsed, and now trainers were just passing through, or bypassing the town altogether now that the word was out that he couldn't battle anymore.

But he was in his room. A room dedicated to the Legendary birds of the world. But more recently, he'd become more and more engrossed with a single bird. If tales were true, it could right the wrongs that the sudden attack had done to his town.

The main problem was that the huge Bellsprout that supported Sprout Tower was dying. The Sages estimated that it could last maybe one, two months at the most. And if it died, then, they said, the town would die.

They had told him that it had gotten so old—so powerful that it was what kept all plant life in a two-mile radius of Violet City blooming all year 'round, with or without snow. That was, after all, how Violet had gotten its name. The founder had come across a meadow of Violets in the dead of winter, after he had left Azalea Town, which he had named because the rain had nurtured so many azaleas in its meadows.

Falkner's gaze returned to the gun. It would be so easy. Should he do it? It wasn't like he could exactly save Violet Town. Not this time. While there was a chance to save his hometown, it didn't look like he'd ever be able to do it. He had responsibilities here, and he wouldn't be able to go out there and do anything about it. And he knew that no one else would be able to do it. He reached out his hand, and it settled around the grip of his pistol. He took a deep breath, held the gun to his head, and squeezed the trigger.

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Bugsy looked up as the heavy door opened, and Blizzard soldier stepped inside the squat, low-ceilinged cell. He carried a high-powered stun gun, that would have the same effects as a Thunderwave on a human body. Bugsy knew this quite well, having tried to escape several times. Whoever had invented the weapon was brilliant, and it was a shame that he was working for these criminals.

His hand unconsciously rubbed his shoulder, and grimaced as he remembered the stinging blast of the weapon. His arm was still a little numb from his last escape attempt the day before, but he was sure that he'd be able to escape somehow. He just needed to wait for another opportune moment. Unfortunately, these people knew that he was a Johto gym leader, and were watching him like a Pidgeot would watch a Caterpie.

That meant that anyone he talked to would be watched just as much, if not more than he was. He sighed. For now, it looked like there was no way out. He glanced up at the gray ceiling as the Blizzard put the plates filled with gruel on the floor for everyone but those few who had tried to escape, and wondered how much longer it would be. It looked like his only possibility for escape was from the outside, and that didn't appear to be in the hand he was dealt.

The sharp command of the guard in front of him jolted him back to reality. He wearily looked up at the guard, and sighed. He might as well acquiesce to his get to his feet, or he'd be paralyzed and dragged out of the cell. Who knew, maybe he'd be able to escape once he was outside the cell. But then again, if security was like anything he'd seen on his previous trips to The Questioner, there probably wouldn't be.

He shuddered as he thought of previous interrogations. He wouldn't wish anything like it on his worst enemy. It was as if someone were peeling back parts of his skin, and forcing him to divulge information he wouldn't otherwise have divulged. Anything from his first kiss, his first girlfriend, where he hid his socks when he was two years old—things that he didn't even remember anymore—he was forced to tell. Fortunately, he was pretty sure that he didn't have any information that they would want.

Of course, this would probably mean that his session would be rougher than anyone else's. If only he could hold on until someone came to rescue him. Someone would come to rescue him, wouldn't they?

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Lorelei sighed, and readjusted her goggles. It was the third time that day she had had to do so. The Nuschantians at the Prito Ski Resort had been kind enough to give them to her, to protect her from the sun's glare off the ice, but the stupid things didn't fit. She'd be half blind if she didn't use, them, of course, so she used them anyway.

But that didn't mean that she had to like them.

And the snowshoes she was wearing? If she had had a choice, she wouldn't have taken them, and just worn boots, but the people at the Lodge had insisted. It had taken her twenty minutes just to learn to stay upright with the annoying things on, and another hour to get the hang of walking with them.

And then there was her guide. He wouldn't shut up, no matter how many times she told him to be quiet, shut up, put a cork in it, or shut his pie hole. He would just natter on and on and on about anything and everything. Although, she had to admit, she did find some of it fascinating, although this only amounted to roughly one percent of what he said.

She sighed and glanced down at the Pokeball that contained the kid's Smoochum. Well, technically, it was hers, but she didn't feel right taking it. In fact, she didn't feel right carrying it. But the boy insisted that she keep it.

Her mind wandered to the fact that she was still alive at all. She had been pushed out of a plane at least a thousand feet in the air, going hundreds of miles an hour. By all rights, she should have died on impact, her body crumpled to nearly the point that it would be unrecognizable or torn apart by the sheer velocity, but, somehow, it was both still intact and alive, and she had no idea how that was even possible. Neither did the people at the ski lodge. She had asked everyone how it was possible, and they all had said that they hadn't thought it was.

She shook her head. However she was still alive, she'd find out how someday. She wasn't sure how she knew it, but she knew it deep within the very essence of her being.

She took out her Pokedex, flipped it open, and waited the few seconds it took for it to boot up. It wasn't that attractive, now that she really looked at it. It was just a block of metal, much like some calculators, and had a simple digital screen. Fortunately, it could hold a lot of information. She manipulated the buttons and initiated a general search on information about Nuschantz. While she waited for the list to compile, she swiped at her nose, which had been running non-stop since nearly the time she'd started her journey in the frozen wasteland, and looked out over the horizon at the vista sitting before her.

Snow-covered mountains stretched as far as the eye could see, but here and there Pokemon moved, or people skied down the side of a mountain in well-marked ski trails, lit by lights illuminating the still-bright night. Sometimes one or the other would be in packs, sometimes they would be traveling solo.

Lorelei frowned. There was one thing she'd forgotten to consider. How would she rescue Bugsy from the Blizzards if she only had the one Pokemon, and that a rather inexperienced Smoochum? It would be nearly impossible. She'd need to get more. Not that there would be many around but Ice types, and even those would be rare.

Of course, she'd need to find the Blizzard Base, first, but that wasn't the point.

She'd need to catch more Pokemon, she decided, then use the rest to battle against to give both of her Pokemon experience in battle. But first, some rest. The little brat had made a snow cave for her, and she crawled inside. "If you stay inside," he said, "it'll fill up with your own body heat, and be kinda warm." Lorelei eyed the walls, expecting them to cave in at any moment, and closed her eyes for some much-needed sleep.

The boy watched her long enough to be sure that she would be comfortable, then moved away, presumably to make his own cave. Of course, she wouldn't put it past the little bugger to kill her in her sleep.

And, of course, she knew that she wasn't paranoid.

Except that that Stantler on the ridge several thousand yards away looked pretty suspicious.

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Eltan paced the room, waiting nervously for his commander to enter the room. The strike on the Verin Retreat had gone brilliantly, and Gertal had been rescued. Of course, the Blizzard Strike Force had taken enormous casualties, but that had been expected in a teleportation retreat. It was an acceptable loss. It would stand out in Nuschantz as one of the pivotal moments in the country's rather haphazard history.

Eltan leaned heavily on the desk, and smiled, remembering the almost traitorous dissapointment and envy he'd felt when he learned that he no longer had command of Team Blizzard. He'd grown fond of the team during Gertal's absence, and had done a good job with it. He had, of course wrestled with the option of making the leader a martyr, but had realized that his men would never forgive him if he did that. And then, he wouldn't have had a team to lead at all.

Yet, still, there was something in the organization that had an almost siren call. He needed to be back in charge of Team Blizzard, or, as Gertal called it, the Blizzard Party. He couldn't explain it. He only knew that he HAD to regain control of the team somehow. The so-called government of Nuschantz needed a serious overhaul, and the leaders of the various retreats around the country showed that they had no intention of bringing one about. Team Blizzard was committed to ensuring that it did, in fact, occur.

Eltan thought about how the team had evolved over the years. The Team Blizzard movement had started with a few disgruntled men from various retreats around the country, led by Gertal, who held a conference that attempted to change the way things were run in Nuschantz, but the leaders of the family retreats refused to listen to them.

For fifteen years, Gertal and his men tried unsuccessfully to institute a series of reforms, but was rebuffed each time. With each attempt, however, the number of his followers grew. Then Gertal had realized that it was impossible to instate reforms while the current leadership was in power, and that it was impossible to oust them from their positions.

So he had gone into the mountains for ten years, and built part of the base that he was standing in today. Then he had emerged, and recruited hundreds of men and women to his cause, as well as thousands of Pokemon to defend themselves when the Nuschantian Resorters, as they were called, began to attack his men when they appeared to discuss politics. That had been three years ago. The leadership of Nuschantz still refused to listen to them, so now, they were forced to take militial action. None of the Blizzards liked it, but they all knew it had to be done, for the sake of the country. Well, maybe some of them liked it. Eltan knew that he had enjoyed it.

The hijacking of the plane had become necessary when Gertal had been captured on the last of his recruitment tours, and the Verin family, the most powerful retreat in Nuschantz, had refused to release him. Eltan was almost disappointed that an opportunity for further battle had not presented itself.

But now, the Blizzards would plan an offensive against the twelve major Nuschantian Retreats. If they planned it well, it would be a relatively bloodless coup. If they planned badly…thousands of humans and Pokemon would die. None of the Blizzards wanted that. Well, he amended silently, almost none.

Eltan was brought out of his revery by the sound of a door opening. He snapped to attention in his crisp, dark-blue uniform, and felt a swell of pride as Gertal himself stepped through the doorway. "I am told," he said in his low, gravelly voice, "That I have you to thank for destroying Verin Retreat's defenses and bringing me back here."

Eltan nodded eagerly, "Yes sir, I did. I hope that you will be proud of me."

Gertal's eyes narrowed, and the man himself bristled. "I did not know how you managed to do it before I got back here, Eltan. When I had left you in charge, I hadn't thought you'd go this far. I had INTENDED to stand trial!" the man exploded, "I wanted to present to the Nuschantian courts the tribulations that the resorters have put us through, so that every resorter and the international community would know what we face every single day! With your single action, you have brought us down to the level of the Rockets! Now people will view us as criminals. You killed in cold blood, Eltan, to free me from prison, and you would have killed more. You hijacked a plane. You all but razed the Verin Retreat! That is not what I want people to remember when they look back on history and write about us."

Eltan felt the sting of the words, and hung his head, but internally bridled. He had done his duty. He had rescued his leader. And now he was being rebuked for it? "I am sorry, sir. I did what I thought was best." He managed to get the words out and apparently Gertal believed him.

He felt Gertal's hands on his shoulders. "But we cannot change the past." The elderly man said in a somewhat calmer voice. "Perhaps, however, in the future, we may be able to atone for what you have done. But it will take time to regain the people's trust. And until we do, we must stop our plans for political reform. The people have to want us to change things. If we go forward now, they will see us as carrying out a vendetta. Treat the hostages for any injuries they may have, and send them to the Verin Retreat." He turned to walk away, then turned back to Eltan, "But I would like to speak with them, before they return."

Eltan waited until the leader had walked out of the room, and engaged the soundproof pseudo-barrier. With all of his might, he voiced his all of his frustration to the empty room. He had done what any true Blizzard would have done, and he had been reprimanded! For carrying out the goals of Team Blizzard!  
Eltan could feel the anger swelling within him, and knew that now it was time to take the path that Ghrenda had been suggesting for months. It was time for him to take Team Blizzard for himself.

Eltan swiped at the holographic controls for the screen in front of himself. If the Blizzards didn't need to follow their pathetically pacifist leader, Team Blizzard could be freed up to bring about their second goal. A goal that Eltan had worked for his entire life.  
What would it be like, he wondered, to have the power to live forever? If his plans worked, it would be within his grasp. But he would not give up the strikes that were planned against Nuschantz. He had worked far too hard to give up now. And the Blizzards would win.

Or die trying.

All it would take would be one extremely powerful Wipe Ball.

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Bugsy blinked at the fire, not exactly understanding how he had gotten there. He remembered the feeling of teleportation, after being blindfolded, and then he had collapsed. He remembered someone talking to him, and the man's face, apologizing and telling him that he never intended for anything like what had happened to happen. But everything past that point was a haze. He had fallen into unconsciousness, and when he had awoken, he was in the ruins of the Verin Retreat.

Physically, he was fine, but he just needed some time to gather his faculties. He glanced over at his Pokemon. They had been returned to him, apparently, when he had been teleported here. He had sent home his Butterfree and Pinsir because he had heard that his sisters were losing nearly every battle they fought, but his Scyther, Beedrill, Heracross, and Forretress remained with him. Scyther hovered in front of the fire, its scythes crossed over each other, and looked deep in thought, staring into the red-orange flames. His Beedrill buzzed back and forth across the room behind Bugsy's high-backed chair, its stingers crossed behind its back. Heracross lay underneath Bugsy's feet, asleep, as usual, while Forretress sat propped up in a corner, where it was trying to sleep despite the incessant buzzing from both his Scyther and Beedrill.

Bugsy rested his head on one of his arms, and he stared into the fireplace, deep in thought. He had gotten word that a young woman matching Lorelei's description had left the Prito Retreat the day before, and he was pretty sure he knew the general area where she would be heading. It was a shame that it couldn't be her, however.

He needed to figure out what to do. According to the reports that he had heard since regaining consciousness, that the Blizzards were preparing another attack force to stage a military coup de tat. He was now faced with the decision of facing off against their attack, which might not come, or go help one of the other many resorts.

The buzzing in the room came down to nearly silent qualities, and Bugsy felt a weight land on the back of the chair. He knew, without looking up, that Beedrill had landed on the chair, and was staring down at him.

Bugsy looked down at his hands, debating what to do. He'd been trying to decide for hours, now. But then, he realized what he had to do. He got up from the chair, careful not to touch Heracross, who, he had learned the hard way, automatically Mega Horned anyone who woke it, and got to his feet.

His Scyther detected the motion and turned ever so slightly so that it faced him. The two looked at each other, and the Scyther suddenly bowed slowly, splaying out his scythes as if it were a soldier of old, showing allegiance to his master.

Bugsy nodded slowly, "Very well then," he said quietly, "We stand and fight."

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Lorelei sputtered through the swirling snow, squinting to try to see the shape of the canine whom she had attacked. She had no doubt that unless she took care of the creature soon, her little Smoochum would be toast. She also knew that there was no way that her Smoochum could faint it, and that, until the Blizzard was over, there was no way she'd be able to capture it. Whatever it was.

All she had known was that a cloud of snow had come after her, and she'd been forced to send out her Smoochum. "Confusion!" Lorelei yelled, and instantly regretted it, as snow filled her mouth. She spat it out, and glared at it as it turned into ice before it swirled away out of her vision.

Once again the wave of Psychic energy spun out from a small point where she guessed her Smoochum was, so powerful that it rippled the very fabric of the space-time continuum, and struck the creature.

There was a momentary pause in the Blizzard as it was forced away by the Confusion, and then it was back with a vengeance. Lorelei wasn't early knocked off her feet. Then she had an idea. "Confusion!" she yelled, and spat out the snow that filled her mouth again, this time pulling out a Pokeball and threw it just behind the attack. It struck something solid, there was the muffled sound of a Pokemon entering a Pokeball, and the wind died down for a moment. Then the Pokeball broke open and for the first time, Lorelei saw her opponent.

It was lupine, and it was beautiful. Its light blue fur seemed to glisten in the sun, and the purple, dark blue, and white strands that were interspersed throughout its coat made it even more beautiful. Its sharp, bared teeth, however, were not so beautiful. Then it was gone as snow swirled up all around it, and once again it pressed its attack.

She had glanced over at her Smoochum just before it was obscured, and she was pretty sure that she couldn't take much more of any attacks. "Confusion," Lorelei shouted again, this time blocking the snow with one hand, and readying a Pokeball in one of her pockets with another. Instantly, the snow ceased its endless flurry, and a beam of pure ice reached out from the cloud and struck her in her stomach, sending her flying back. She had counted on something like this, however, and called out again, "Confusion!"

The dog, unprepared for an attack, was sent skidding as well, and staggered to its feet, disoriented. Lorelei pulled the Pokeball from her pocket and hurled it at her opponent, who was sucked inside by the familiar red beam, and, after shaking furiously for thirty seconds, a ding could be heard, softened by both distance and the snow that still hung in the air, falling lightly to the ground.

Lorelei gasped for breath as the pain of the Ice Beam finally hit her full force, and she could see Lukas running up to her. Her Smoochum swooned, and dropped to the snow. Then, a sudden wave of elation made her cry out. The victorious cry didn't last long, however, and she curled up into a nearly fetal position, holding her stomach, hoping that she wouldn't throw up.

But inside, she was celebrating. She had done it. She had caught her first Pokemon. Now, she'd be able to pose a slightly more significant threat when she next faced the Blizzards. She pulled the Smoochum's Pokeball from her belt and held it out. The baby dematerialized out of her sight range, and she felt the slight recoil that always accompanied the return of a Pokemon, then she reattached the Pokeball to her belt.

She was a real trainer now, and she felt as if a huge weight had been lifted off of her shoulders. This time she'd be sure to be careful, and she'd try not to take too many risks. She would make sure that they survived, and that they would be the best.

"Are you all right?" she heard Lukas ask, and she looked up, and forced herself to sit up, despite the throbbing pain.

"Yeah," she said, and was instantly upset because of the effort it took just to breathe and say a word, not to mention sitting up. Steeling herself, she stood up, walked over to the dog's Pokeball stiffly, and promptly collapsed.

Lukas was there, instantly, offering to help her back up, but she shook him off. Instead, she stared at the Pokeball in her hand, and the small light that indicated that it was occupied. "Where's the nearest retreat?" she asked, knowing she had to get both her Pokemon healed as soon as she could.

Lukas consulted his Pokedex, and Lorelei got to her feet wearily and walked over to her backpack, which she had taken off to help give her ease of mobility back when she thought that the small blizzard hadn't been a Pokemon.

She put it on slowly, wincing with every movement, and looked at Lukas expectantly. He pointed in the direction they had been going, "One and a half miles, this way," he said, and started walking. "I saw the tail end of that battle. I'll handle any battles we may come across," he said and Lorelei nodded, in too much pain to argue.

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Coming up next...

Lorelei will visit the first resort she will have been to since arriving in Nuschantz. It's basically a superstore. She will be reunited with someone whom she had completely forgotten about, and someone whom had never lost her mind...as well as a trio whom she has thought about quite a bit for seven long years...:D

and someone else will show up that you're not expecting to...:D

no more pseudo-spoilers for you guys...read and review, and wait for the next chapter.


	12. Reunions

well, people, it's been a long time since my last update. Sorry about that. The good news, however, is that I have completed this fic, so I should be able to finish uploading this soon...This is chapter 11, contrary to what the Chapter thing for this fic says, and I got up to 18 chapters. However, it will probably be more like 16 chapters, because a bunch of the last few chapters were only five pages long. You have no idea the plot twists that are coming. They will blow your mind.

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The leader had grown weak in his old age. And that meant that he could no longer rule over the team. Eltan's eyes narrowed as he walked into his room, still feeling the sting of his master's stern rebuke. That had been a deadly mistake, although Gertal didn't realize it.

Eltan closed and locked the door. He went to his closet, and stepped inside, similarly locking the door behind himself. He pulled out a small flashlight and turned it on to examine more closely the environs in which he found himself. He located the hidden button and pushed it. A panel slid back to reveal a hidden room, and quickly stepped through before the door snapped shut noiselessly on hidden hinges.

After the door was closed, the lights came up, revealing an array of advanced communications gear, and flashing consoles. He moved over to one that was dark, and pushed several buttons. Within moments, lights flared to life, and the hidden communications array was ready.

He pulled out his pocket chronometer, flipped it open, checked the time, and adjusted the frequency. He keyed a query. If anyone saw his transmission, they would think that it was simply a spike in the force field containment power in the sewage part of the base.

Eltan quivered with barely controlled rage. How dare Gertal speak to him like that. If only Gertal knew who he really was. If he did, then he would have been pleading for his life. The only reason that Eltan hadn't struck him down where he stood was because he wasn't ready to fight every single Blizzard using only his fists. Not yet. But he had friends that would help him.

Gertal's desire for the conquest of Nuschantz had been a key factor in his master's plans. Now that he didn't want to fight them anymore, he was simply a roadblock to be removed. Gertal had weakened him. And anything that weakened him would be killed. It was as simple as that.

And when the time came to kill the doddering old man, Eltan would not forget it. Words from some piece of classic literature he had heard somewhere came back to him. "If you cut us do we not bleed," he murmured to himself, "If you tickle us do we not laugh?" a slow, almost devilish smile passed across his face, "If you poison us, do we not die?" his eyes narrowed as he began formulating plans, knowing that headquarters would confirm what he had already decided to do.

"And if you wrong us," he said softly, "Will we not revenge?" The last sentence of the prose he had been reciting subconsciously echoed around the small room, seeming to bring him energy just hearing the words.

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Lorelei stared up at the Resort, not believing what she was seeing. The place was huge. At least three quarters the size of Silph Company's headquarters in Saffron City. In other words, about forty stories high. Lukas had told her that it was the shopping capitol of the country.

The Itale Retreat, he had told her, was also the second largest in terms of land area. Lorelei moved forward slowly, not really believing that somehow they'd managed to bring in all the building material. And how in the world did they bring in everything that they needed to sell?

"Teleporters," Lukas responded to her question, grinning, "We've got a massive Teleporting network over the entire country. Mainly Jynx. There are outposts throughout the mountain that hold about thirty Jynx at a time. They're usually staffed by a family or two. It makes getting things or people from one place to another really easy, since we don't really have roads, and it's not very easy to travel otherwise."

Lorelei stopped, and glared at him, "Then why," she asked, her eyes narrowing, "didn't we take them here?"

Lukas grinned, "Because it's more fun this way." He darted in front her towards the entrance to the Itale Lodge, and it was all Lorelei could do to suppress the urge to strangle the little bugger. Actually, it was more like her Smoochum freezing her feet in place.

"Hey," she grumbled, "Will you stop doing that?" she demanded. She needed to get inside as quickly as possible. She knew that Sneasel was fit to travel, but obviously not to fight, and she'd be able to pick him up here.

"Smooch, um, um, smoochum!" her baby ice-type replied replied, and Lorelei wished, not for the first time, that it could talk English, or that she could speak Smoochum. But at least it unfroze her feet with a weak Confusion. Of course, her feet were very sore afterwards, but at least she could move around.

She stalked up towards the Lodge, and threw open the doors which had closed behind Lukas, and stopped dead. There were stores of many kinds throughout the first level. It looked more like a mall than a ski lodge. She walked forward, glaring at any shopkeeper who came close to her, and finally found the room where the skiers actually relaxed.

She peeked around, and was relieved to see that there were no shops inside. It was a large room, probably fifty feet in length, with a Nurse Joy and a Chansey by a large fireplace. And, more importantly, a desk with a Pokeball teleportation pad and a Healer. Comfy seats were stationed near the fireplace and the Nurse Joy.

Lorelei hurried up to the Nurse Joy, who was deep in conversation with Lukas, who kept pointing at her and talking excitedly. Lorelei groaned, and stepped up her pace. When she reached the Nurse Joy, the woman stared at her, as if in shock, "You actually want to go see Allnian?" the nurse shook her head, "young lady, do you know how many people have died trying to do that?" she caught sight of her Sneasel, "And what did you do to your poor Smoochum?" she exclaimed, jumping to her feet, and nearly knocking over her Healing machine.

Lorelei narrowed her eyes, "Look, lady," she riposted, "Right now, I care about one thing, and one thing only. Contact the Prito Resort. My Sneasel's resting there, because the Verin Retreat was too dangerous. Send it here, now!"

The Nurse Joy made a face at her but initiated a query of the Prito Ski Resort. It took five minutes before someone on the other end responded, but finally the transportation process took place. Except, when it was over, TWO Pokeballs were sitting on the array.

She spotted Sneasel's Pokeball at once by the distinctly Altan art on it. She grabbed Sneasel's Pokeball and held the other up to the Joy. "What's this?" she demanded suspiciously.

"Yachne Prito said that that had been at the Verin Retreat at the time of the attack, and had been sent there to be kept safe. It's one of Johto's Professor Elm's Vulithe." The Nurse Joy explained, glancing down at the laptop computer that was connected to both the teleportation array and the Healer. "Apparently, he hasn't asked for it back yet."

Lorelei released her Sneasel as close to the ground as she could, and felt a wave of relief flood through her as her Sneasel leapt up, albeit missing its left arm, and hugged her. Lorelei forgot about everything else and wrapped Sneasel up into her arms. It felt so right to have her there. She had nearly forgotten why she had come to Nuschantz in the first place, and now she was reminded of her Pokemon's predicament. She had begun to doubt herself, but now…now she knew that she'd do it, on her own with only her fists, if need be.

Lorelei felt tears begin to well up in her eyes, and made no effort to stop them. If she didn't have him, then what did she have to live for? Nothing at all. But now she was reunited with Sneasel at last, and everything would be okay. Sneasel was the only surviving link that she had to her past. Well, that HAD been the case in Kanto, but why did it have to be so now?

Tears still rolling down her cheeks, she looked up at the Nurse Joy and asked, "What's the limit of Pokemon a person can have at any one time in this country?" she asked.

The Nurse Joy smiled, obviously touched by the reunion, "Why, it's ten, I believe."

Lorelei's eyes narrowed, and she felt the old, familiar, assertive grin begin to spread across her face. "I need to make a long-range teleportation request. Key up Silph Company Headquarters in Alto. I need to talk with my brother."

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Bugsy looked up from the map he'd been studying of the layout of the country around the Verin Estate and saw Lefar Verin himself coming through the door. He was something of a military man, and Bugsy had nothing but respect for the man. Bugsy had, with a lot of the older man's help, plotted out a defense strategy.

"I have word," Lefar said. The gray-haired man smiled at him, and said, "It appears that after your help planning out our defense here, the other Retreats would like your assistance in planning their defenses as well."

Bugsy nodded, "All right. Not like there's a lot that I can do here. I'll assemble my team and get moving."

Lefar nodded, and held out something covered in cloth. "I thought as much. But first, I want you to have this. It used to belong to a Johtan general back in the times of the Reformation." Bugsy nodded. He hadn't learned a lot of Nuschantian history, but he knew that the Reformation was basically a revolution that had risen up about a thousand years prior against a dictatorial tyrant named Tadorae, and that Kantans and Johtans had been instrumental in helping the Nuschantians learn how to fight.

Bugsy nodded, "Thanks, Lefar." He'd learned already that refusing a gift in Nuschantz was the equivalent of slapping the person offering the gift in the face. He took the velvet-covered sword, and smiled, "Well," he said, "I guess I'd better be going."

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Lorelei grinned into the receiver, "Thanks, Brandon, I owe you one." She said, and looked triumphantly at the Nurse Joy. "All right. He's got the Pokemon I want isolated in their Pokeballs on a teleporter array, he's going to be fronting the bill, and you don't want to know what I'm gonna do if you don't teleport those four Pokemon over here."

The Nurse Joy made a face at her again and Lorelei took a deep breath as she held the Pokeball that contained the Vulithe in front of her and brushed the release button. Instantly, a beam of red light formed, and a form began to appear.

A short, almost canine figure materialized. Its strong, semi-muscular legs were tense, it had a mane and three thick, bushy tails, long ears, and its fur was a warm, chocolaty brown. Where it wasn't burnt.

The creature was in bad shape. It was ripped open, bitten, burned, frozen, and singed. Lorelei heard the nurse Joy gasp, and it was all that Lorelei herself could do to keep from throwing up. Without thinking, she scooped up the Poekmon, and set it onto the Healing Machine.

To the horror of the Nurse Joy, she turned to the laptop and activated the Healer. "Don't!" The Nurse Joy cried, "That much radiation in that quantity will kill it! Recall it first!" Lorelei hurriedly recalled it and put the Pokeball into one of the grooves that had been designed to hold Pokeballs, but hurriedly pulled her hand back as something seemed to scorch her hand.

As Lorelei stomped around the room yelling and shaking her hand as fast as she could, her Sneasel, now sitting on top of a chair and watching her with an amused expression on her face, waited patiently for the tirade to end.

The Nurse Joy watched her with a deadpan expression on her face. "Didn't you learn anything in Pokemon Training Survival 101?" The Nurse Joy demanded, "Pokemon are healed in Healing Machines by Grenthor Radiation. If the Pokemon isn't protected, it will be affected by the radiation will kill it and any other living thing by breaking down the chemical bonds that compose it."

Lorelei glared at the Nurse. Lorelei definitely wasn't in the mood for any lectures. She glanced at the teleportation array, and spotted the Pokeballs. She hurried over and grabbed the Pokeballs with her left, unburned hand. Immediately, she released them. Her original Pokemon, Haunter, Duskull, and a Sneasel appeared. For a moment she didn't recognize Graveller, but then realized that he had evolved into a Golem. The four took a moment to look around the room, and then Haunter, Duskull, and Golem hurried to Lorelei and embraced her. Sneasel, on the other hand, rushed over to embrace his daughter.

For the second time that day, Lorelei's eyes filled with tears. "I'll explain everything," she said to the elder Sneasel as he glared at her accusedly, "Just give me a second."

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Eltan smiled as he shut his communications equipment down. Headquarters had confirmed what he should do. Eliminate Gertal, and conquer Nuschantz. It was vital that it happened.

It seemed odd, though, Eltan thought, that his masters in the Specter Corporation would want to take over a country. He knew that Specter Corporation's legitimate businesses rivaled both Devon Co. and Silph Company. They were ruled by a board of directors, which was led by two Directors.

They made all the decisions regarding the Specter Shadow Guard, which furthered their aims by unofficially acting on behalf of their employers. And if all of their actions weren't necessarily on the up and up, that just meant that their extensive training paid off.

It certainly had for Eltan. He hadn't seen any of his fellow Shadow Guard members for several years, but he knew that it was just part of the job. And, right now, his job was to eliminate any and all resistance to Team Blizzard in Nuschantz. And if people would die while he achieved his goals?

Then so be it.

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"And so we just need to find Allnian," Lorelei finished, "And make it heal Sneasel." Both of the Sneasel looked at her. "Er, Sneasel Junior anyway." She amended quickly.

The Nurse Joy rolled her eyes and shook her head sadly, "You think it's that simple, don't you, young lady? That you can just waltz in and see Allnian? I'm afraid that you couldn't be more wrong. As you may or may not know, Nuschantz has three guardians. Auroura, Borealis, and Austrealis. All three have to agree that you can see Allnian before you can see Allnian, according to what we've been told. And once they've agreed, you have to climb five thousand feet nearly straight up to Allnian's eyrie. Men have spent years trying to find the Guardian tigers of Nuschantz. What makes you think that you'll find them any easier?"

Lorelei grinned as she listened to Nurse Joy's monologue, and replied, "Well, I've always enjoyed a good challenge. I'll find a way."

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The metaphorical figure stared at the timeline he had been supervising. He had tried to interfere, but the woman had rebuffed him. And now things were getting more and more out of hand, and farther and farther from the original timeline. The temporal flux was becoming more and more unstable.

The Dark One's armies were growing too rapidly, being drawn from too many timelines. They were gathering in the Dark Nexus Realm, and were preparing for an attack. The Council was preparing its defense, but things were not looking up. Nothing like this had ever happened before. The Guardians weren't doing their jobs, and the portals had been taken by the Dark One.

The man who had tried to intervene in the Central Timeline slumped back, and a chair appeared underneath him. He had no idea how he would right the temporal incursions. And time was running out. The clock was ticking faster. Now he only had a month and a half, Central Timeline days, before there would be no way to prevent the escape of the Dark One.

He had to do something.

And he had to do it fast.

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Lorelei walked through the stores, amazed that there was so much diversity in everything that there was. She could probably buy everything, including the resort, due to her family's position in Silph Company, but then her parents probably wouldn't let her near the family checking account for years afterward.

She grinned at the though, and knew that some girls that had the nearly unlimited resources that she had would go nuts, and just buy and buy and buy. She, on the other hand, would go slowly, and buy just what she would need. So far, that had come up to about seven thousand dollars worth of healing supplies. True, that actually wasn't a lot of healing supplies, but it was quite a bit of money.

She had it all in her backpack, and her younger Sneasel, whom she had dubbed Junior, was watching out for anything that she might need. If she saw something, Junior would yank on her hair and point it out to her. So far, she'd pointed out a clothing sale, a clothing sale, a shoe sale, a hat sale, a hair cutter's shop, a clothing sale, and another hat sale. Lorelei shook her head. Why wouldn't she do anything that would help her? She ignored every single Pokemon supplies store, and kept pointing out shops of that manner.

Golem, Senior—The elder Sneasel, Duskull, and Haunter were elsewhere in the massive resort, procuring goods. The Vulithe, now fully healed, trotted along at her side, keeping an eye on Frocarin—the ice dog she'd caught earlier. Vulithe, who had had many trainers before her, and would likely have many after, had trusted her instantly. However, when she'd let the Forcarin out for the first time, it had taken nearly a half hour to get within recall range again, let alone near it. It seemed to enjoy being by itself, but she had made it clear to the Pokemon that it was part of her team, and she wasn't releasing it. It was an odd feeling, having six battle-ready Pokemon. Only a few hours before, she had had only one, and now, by Kantan standards, she had a complete team. She'd called in the heavy artillery, and she was ready to fight.

She grinned. Now she'd be able to show whoever might get into her way who was boss. In fact, she was almost looking forward to it.

She shook her head and adjusted her backpack. She felt Junior shift slightly to maintain his balance, and then resumed her vigil. Lorelei grinned. She hated to admit it, but this was kind of fun.

Of course, the best part was having all the nerds in the Pokedex store drool over new Pokedex. She grinned. It was the simple things in life that you treasured most.

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"Mike!" Lukas called out, and Lorelei glared down at him. She had thought she had ditched the little sucker back at the Retreat's Pokémon Center. Somehow he had found her. She was convinced that he had hid a homing beacon somewhere on her body. But then, with Vulithe and the rest of her team, she did kind of stand out.

Lorelei glanced over at where her pseudo-guide was looking, and saw another little kid. She groaned to herself. She couldn't stand little kids. If she ever married, she'd go after him with a pair of garden shears before he laid a hand on her. Okay, so maybe she was exaggerating. She'd just use an ordinary pair of scissors.

Her dislike of little kids made no exception for him, especially when she spotted the Cyndaquil on the kid's shoulder. If there was one thing that she hated more than kids, it was fire types. The little rat stared at her, and for some reason, it made her nervous. Fire types always had.

Ever since that Arcanine had stepped on her head in the petting zoo while she was trying to pull its mate's tail. Of course, the mate had asked for it, because it had grabbed the rest of her cotton candy. Although that may have been a reprisal for refusing to give it back one of its Growlithe. But it had started it by growling at her. She shook her head. Why some people thought that Growlithes and Arcanines were a good judge of character was beyond her. They stunk at it.

"Hey, Lukas! Good to see you again!" the kid's energetic, buoyant tone made Lorelei want to scream. It was one thing to put up with Lukas, but this new kid's energy was just…just…She couldn't find the words to describe it. "When did you get back here?" Maybe she could just slink away, and he wouldn't notice her. "You said you didn't think you'd be back here for a couple months!"

Lukas grinned and jabbed a finger at her, and Lorelei sighed. She should have known it was impossible to escape the kid, "She's gonna try to reach Allnian. I'm her guide! Wanna come see?"

Lorelei glared at him. It was one thing to have to follow the kid around, but having to put up with his friends too? It was almost too much to bear. She opened her mouth to say something, but the kid stuck his hand out. "Hi!" he said in a painfully cheerful voice, "I'm Mike Gallow, I just moved here from Blackthorne. Hey, I know you! You're the girl from the Cherrygrove Pokemon Center!"

Lorelei squinted as she took the kid's hand, then realized that she did, indeed, recognize the kid as one of the brats from the Pokemon Center that Elm had given starters to. She glared at the Cyndaquil, and it glared back, then smirked as she took the kid's hand. "So I'm gonna be traveling with you, then?" he asked, "Great!" he said, before she could reply, "I've always wanted to see Sheer Cliff."

Lorelei frowned, and turned to Lukas. "Sheer Cliff?" she demanded, feeling a twinge of uneasiness set in.

"Oh, yeah. It's the cliff that Allnian lives on top of. It's almost vertical on every side." Lukas grinned at her, "Really beautiful. A big tourist attraction. A hundred people get hurt permanently trying to climb it each year. But I know that you won't have to worry about that."

Lorelei swallowed. Suddenly, finding Allnian was starting to sound harder and harder. She glanced back at Senior, her very first Pokemon, who smiled encouragingly. Lorelei swallowed hard and knew that very soon, she'd be tested to the end of her limits.

She turned around to leave, and bumped into someone. "Sorry," came a familiar voice.

Lorelei frowned. She knew that voice. She looked up. "Falkner?" she asked, not believing her eyes, "What are you doing here?"

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Eltan clapped the Blizzard he had been talking to on the back and continued on his rounds. He'd been assigned to survey the outer defenses. He'd found that almost half the men that he asked considered Gertal unfit for command of the team. He was certain that within hours, he could announce his takeover of the team over the entire base, and he'd be able to come out of it alive.

Gertal would never allow him to live, of course, if he made such a pronouncement, and would try to kill him. But if he were to kill the old man, then he would be the uncontested ruler of Team Blizzard, and they would be able to rule the entire country, and possibly expand its borders at the same time. He'd heard rumors that news of the attack plan had been leaked, and that trainers from all over the world were coming to Nuschantz, but he wasn't worried. If he lured them out into the wilderness, he and the other Blizzards would have no trouble eliminating any opposition.

He had heard rumors that the Bug type Gym Leader Bugsy of Johto himself was going to be planning the defenses of the resorters. Eltan frowned. They should have killed him when they had the chance. He was one of the greatest Gym Leaders in the world, and the fact that he was helping his enemies gave Eltan a slight moment of pause. But it was nothing that he couldn't handle.

The elder fool, Gertal, actually thought that the troop build-up he had begun a few hours before actually had to do with finding Allnian, and asking it to help them in their war against the Nuschantian Retreats. And it was a war, whether the old man realized it or not.

He would find Allnian, and it would help them in their war, but they would not ask. They would demand. They would capture the so-called Legendary, enslave it with the newest Wipe Ball ever to come off Specter Corporation's assembly lines, and force it to give his men eternal life, and a cure for any disease or injury that they might sustain.

With a broken Allnian under his control, there was nothing that would prevent him from dominating the world. Him. Not Specter Corporation. They were fools too, if they thought that giving him all that money would make them loyal enough that he would give up the opportunity to rule the world.

Of course, he was sure that they weren't that stupid, which meant that they had operatives within Team Blizzard. He would have to tread very carefully, or he'd end up as nothing more than another world ruler wannabe. He would rule the world. There was no changing that.

When he would was the issue, however.

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Bugsy shoved open the simple doors to the Prito Ski Resort Retreat and entered quickly, closing the doors behind himself. He took off his hat and gloves, and grinned at Yachne, the main proprietor of the resort, he'd been told. "Hi," he said, waving as he took off his coat, "I'm sure that Lefar got word to you that I was coming."

The rather large woman's face brightened, "Oh!" she exclaimed, "You're the one that wants to help us defend ourselves. I just baked some cookies, would you like some?"

Bugsy chuckled, "Thanks," he replied, "But no thanks. I'd like to get started on my work first." He glanced around, "Where's Lukas? Lefar suggested that I talk to him. Said something about him being quite the Pokémon trainer."

Yachne smiled, "I'm sorry, but he left yesterday with a girl called…what was her name? It was Altan, I know that. Oh, yes!" she cried, "It was a girl named Lorelei. She's got the insane notion in her head that she's going to find Allnian."

Bugsy felt his blood run cold. It wasn't possible. It just wasn't. She was dead. He'd seen her go out the door of the plane himself. He'd heard the explosion. It HAD been her, the explosion, right? It had to be. And even if it hadn't been, the impact from falling from that high up would have killed her instantly.

"Are you all right?" the woman asked, "You look like you've seen a ghost."

Bugsy swallowed hard, and looked her straight in the eye, "Actually," he said slowly, "I think you did."

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The metaphorical figure ground his teeth. He wouldn't be able to afford any more delays. There was simply nothing for it, but he had to intervene in the Physical Realm. But how? How could he do such a thing?

Then, the man formerly known as Gerahid the Liberator smiled. He had an idea. He knew of a woman from the past that would be perfect for the job. She was smart, cunning, strong, bullheaded, beautiful, and, at one point, had been his second chance at true love, after his wife had died.

Unfortunately, both of them had died as well, before anything could happen. He smiled, and began making the necessary arrangements. He smiled and prepared for a temporal transport.

There was only one person that he'd trust this mission to. With one final gesture, he said the woman's name aloud, tenderly. "Devon." He could almost hear her voice.

Of course, it had been a constant harangue, but maybe she and this Lorelei would get along good because they were so much alike, albeit from completely different centuries.

Gerahid grinned, and finalized the transport. Now, there was no reversing it, and there was no way that he'd be able to do anything more. Once the Council found out about this, they'd have his tail in a sling, not that h eh ad a tail, unlike many of them, and he'd be restricted from ever having anything to do with the Physical Realm. Aside, from maybe Passive watching under their close supervision.

He only hoped that it was worth it.

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wow...grins well, next time will come something that you probably expected, and something that I doubt you expected.

but that isn't the major plot twist.

Oh no, not yet.


	13. The Board is Set

Eltan studied the map carefully, and began his planning once more. While he was physically able to take over the Team Blizzard Base, he wanted to be sure that he had contingencies in place in case he failed. And for that, he needed to take into account the entire continent of Multipol.

It was truly an amazing place, he mused to himself, as it was the only continent in the world that had every major climate in the world. While the continent was mainly in the tropics, the elevation of the continent gave it numerous climates.

Acquar, the lowest country on the continent, was home to a desert, a mile below sea level. Very few people went to Acquar, or the Acquan Desert, but those that called it home enjoyed it very much. In addition, it was home to a Team Magma Primary Regional Base, and an Aquan Regional Secondary Base, as well as a relative newcomer to the scene, Team Solar, an off-shoot of Team Magma. Eltan smiled as he shook his head. He couldn't imagine living in such a place. The heat would truly be excruciating. That was probably why the Magmans, Solars, and Fire types thrived there, and the Aqua Base was on the tropical coastline.

The Acquarans were always a wild card. One never knew which way they'd go. Their tempers were as short as an Ursaring's tail, and packed about as much punch as one of their fists as well. They were masters of desert warfare, that much was certain, but they would be at a distinct disadvantage in the mountains. They had always been staunch opponents of Team Blizzard and its policies. Although Gertal had been working towards an understanding with them for quite some time, if he asked for their help when he made his move, they'd have to take to the open sea, of which they had always been terrified, or pass through one of the two countries separating them from Nuschantz—Sintaur or Effeular. And he had no doubt that if they came into his battles, they'd come in on the side of Gertal. So he had to plan to that effect.

Effeular was a truly unique country. It had a large swath of desert on its western side, bordering Acquar, and a large mountain range on the east, between which was a long stretch of prairie. Effeular had been in a civil war for years, and it showed no signs of ending anytime soon. The unique thing about this civil war, however, was that it was not humans against humans, but rather humans against Pokémon.

The Pokémon inhabited the mountains, the tropical jungles of the coastline, and the desert of the country, while the humans held onto the vast grassland in the middle of the country, with most of their population in heavily guarded forts. While they would not be any immediate threat, Eltar knew from experience that the Effeulans, both Pokémon and human, would slaughter any Pokémon trainer and all Pokémon that s/he carried, as they considered them to be traitors. So the Effeulan border was secure, unless the humans or the Pokémon decided to launch an assault onto Nuschantian soil.

While the Effeulans treated Pokémon as inferior beings to be wiped off the face of the planet, Sintaurans treated them nearly as their equals. They, like the humans of Effeular, had mainly plains, although near their Acquarran borders, they had stretches of desert.

Sintaurans were horse lords, master of the Pokémon Equus. They didn't really care what the Pokémon's type was, as long as it could be ridden, driven, or utilized in some equinnian way. Pokémon trainers came from all over the world to have their horses trained by the Sintaurans.

While their military power was nearly unmatched on the continent, Eltan wasn't worried about them. While they would let the Acquarrans pass through their lands, they themselves wouldn't take place in any war. They were a people that enjoyed peace, and didn't realize that the best defense was a surgical strike designed to bring enemies to their knees in one swift stroke.

That brought him around to his main concern. The Nuschantians themselves. While most of the dozens of resorts were pathetically weak, the main nine resorts were most definitely a force to be reckoned with. His main concerns were with the Hampton Haven, Hudson Resort, and the McRae Retreat.

The Hampton Haven and the Hudson Resort were the two resorts nearest the main Blizzard Fortress. Any major offensive move would give away the Fortress' location, as would any action against Gertal. Therefore, both an attack on the Hudson Resort and the strike against Gertal would have to take place at the same time.

The Hudson Resort was a primary target, as it was between the Blizzard Fortress and its Secondary Base, and was closest to the Fortress. The McRae Retreat was in between the Fortress and the Secondary as well, but was closer to the still-concealed Secondary, and so could wait until elements from the McRae Retreat sallied out to help the Hudson Resort. Then, the Secondary Base would disgorge its army, and take the McRae Retreat by storm.

Eltan wasn't sure yet if he wanted to keep the McRae Retreat, or raze it to the ground. He'd decide later.

Something was wrong. The Purple-haired woman frowned, and lowered her sword. She had been, a moment ago, about to be impaled by a Spectaero on the battlefields of Tintia, and now here she was, far from that warm place, on some kind of mountainside covered with snow blowing all around her.

She frowned as she shivered, and looked around for the others in her team. "Muscos?" she said softly, but couldn't see the equine anywhere. That was odd. It was usually within visual range. Her hand fell to the reassuring butt of her whip, and she smiled. Wherever she was, she'd get through it, and find some way back to help get Gerahid out of his jam.

She glanced around, and plunged her sword into the snow. She didn't recognize where she was, but that wasn't THAT odd, since she had never gone more than a couple hundred miles from her home island of Alto in her life.

Well, she amended silently, except for that one trip to the Orange Islands when she had been a sailor. She grinned as she remembered the storms, and the struggles to survive. She brought her sword up to her face, and wiped the crimson-stained snow off of her sword, and put it back into its scabbard.

It didn't look like there were any enemies around here, but one never knew. Then she felt the cold. She had felt it before, but its sheer frigidness struck her almost like a physical blow. Suddenly, she was shivering uncontrollably, and she knew she had to find some sort of shelter, and soon.

She looked around, and spotted smoke. She turned around and ran for it, ignoring the cold on her bare feet. She knew that she didn't have long. She needed to get warm soon. Or she'd never survive to see old Skin and Bones Muscos, or her beloved Gerahid again.

As she ran, the tattered ruins of her once beautiful dress flared out behind her like a shroud.

Bugsy smiled at Yachne Prito, trying to hide his confusion. He knew for a fact that Lorelei had died. Or, at least, he was fairly certain that she had died. But had she really died? If she hadn't, how had she possibly survived?

Bugsy shook his head and started off towards the frozen lake, and the waiting plane. He'd be flown to the Davison's next. And from there to the Duvalle's, then the Hampton's. he smiled slightly. Just a little bit longer, and he'd be sitting down enjoying one of the Davison's legendary pies.

He was still smiling when he was struck from the side, and everything turned black.

Gertal was finishing reading messages he had received from the Acquarrians while he had been captured by the Nuschantians, when the noise startled him. He looked up, and looked around his massive control room, but didn't see anything wrong. He frowned. Something was wrong. He wasn't sure what it was, but there was something amiss.

His men had been giving him a wide berth all day, and now there was that strange clang, just as quickly silenced. The leader of Team Blizzard frowned. Something was wrong. Very wrong. He hit a few keys, and the view from the camera outside his control room appeared on the monitor. Except, it didn't. The computer told him that he was seeing what was outside his room, but the monitor was black.

Immediately, he leapt into action. He hadn't gotten to where he was by taking a lot of time to analyze things. It felt like an assassination attempt—a hit. He pushed his chair back and pulled open a drawer. He grabbed his emergency escape pack, and stood up, grabbing that one other piece of technology—if you could call it that—from the drawer, and kicked it shut.

On the slab of metal that he'd taken, he pushed on a particular point with just enough pressure. Immediately, bands of metal popped loose, and the device's twin wings shot out. He ducked down, and began moving backwards, towards the emergency escape hatch.

Then the door blew open. Gertal rose slightly, bringing the fully automatic crossbow to bear, and triggered two darts. A figure that was moving through the smoke staggered backwards, and another figure took his place, and Gertal heard the report of a handgun. He dropped to the ground and rolled backwards, and the bullet missed him by inches.

Gertal continued his roll, then came up, and fired quickly at the figure. There was a feminine scream, and his attacker dropped its weapon. Another report, and it struck him in his right shoulder, sending him to the back of the room, and directly onto the platform. Gritting his teeth, he slammed his hand down onto the control panel. The dropped crossbow was only a few feet in front of him, but he didn't have time to go for it now.

The experimental remote teleporter whirred, and suddenly, he was in the stables. It had been an acceptable risk, taking the remote teleporter out for a test run. Of course, if whoever was in charge of the attempt had access to the Alakazam that allowed its function, they would know where he was. He ran for the nearest Arcteron, and leaped aboard. He ran for the door, and entered his override codes, and spurred his steed out into the cold that was Nuschantz.

He felt a sudden chill run through him that had nothing to do with the weather around him as he replayed his escape. He had recognized the woman and the man behind her that had entered the room just as he had teleported away.

It was Eltan, and his most trusted friend, Ghrenda.

The Team Blizzard Fortress was no longer a safe place for him to be. He had to reach the Secondary Base on the Effeulan Border. It would take him days on his Arcteron, but a secondary Jynx teleportation stable run by Team Blizzard Operatives was just ahead. From there, he'd be able to get to the Secondary Base much faster. That is, if they weren't working against him as well. If he got to the Secondary Base safely, he could safely plan his retaliation on Eltan.

So Eltan wanted to play hardball? Gertal smiled softly, ignoring the pain that coursed through him from his shoulder wound. If his lieutenant wanted to play that way, he'd have to show him how hard he could throw.

"Are you just going to stand there and wait for a Polleen to fly in," Lorelei asked pointedly, breaking a long pause that had settled in, "Or are you going to answer my question?" She stared up at the trainer in front of her.

"Sorry," he apologized quickly. He'd had so much on his mind. He hadn't expected to see Lorelei. "It's good to see you," he said softly. There was nothing like a close brush with death, he mused, to bring home what was really important.

Lorelei stared up at him, and Falkner realized that she had no idea what he had gone through. "It's good to see you too, at least, if you answer my question, it will be, or you won't be seeing anyone for a while through your black eyes!"

Falkner smiled, "Lorelei," he said quietly, "Can we talk, privately? Maybe the food court?"

"Ya call that private?" the girl demanded, but nodded tightly anyway.

Eltan stared at the dark figure that was his commander in the Specter Shadow Guards. "Gertal," he said, more than a little nervous, "has escaped. He was able to teleport away before we could stop him. He's more than likely heading to the Secondary Base."

The dark figure shifted slightly. The angle of the lighting was such that Eltan couldn't see his face. "So you'll be able to capture him when he reaches the base?" came the question Eltan had been dreading.

"I'm afraid," Eltan said quietly, "That the Secondary Base supported Gertal more than I expected. Team Blizzard is in for a long war, sir. I can't see us completing our objectives within five years, sir."

The figure leaned forward menacingly, "Then it's time that I step in. I'm sending five AA squads, as well as the 'Three Squad. The invasion will take place in sixteen hours, Eltan, or you're a dead man. I want you to have completed your goals by then. Or I'll have you brought here so I can kill you myself." The leader of one of the most powerful organized crime organizations slapped a button, and the screen went dark.

The boy stepped off the plane, and walked towards the Verin Retreat's main Lodge. His overseers had informed him that this was the place. That this was the time. He narrowed his eyes. It wouldn't be too long, and he'd be able to complete his objectives. True, then he'd cease to exist, because he had changed the past, or, from this perspective, the present.

But that didn't matter. All that mattered was that he completed his mission. If he did not, then he was ruined. He glanced down to check on his Pokeballs. Hideous contraptions, he and his Pokémon had agreed. But they had also agreed that if they were out of their Pokeballs, they'd attract unwanted attention.

The boy breezed through the rest of the required stops for out of country visitors, and started walking into the countryside. Few glanced his way, because, he assumed, it happened all the time.

What separated him from the masses, however, was his mission. He had to change the future. He had done it before in this relative time period, and he would do it again. As soon as he was out of sight, he released his Dragonite, Houndoom, Mightyena, Hypno, and Raichu.

The Dragonite wheeled into the sky, spreading its dark wings, and sped ahead of the boy like some kind of twisted carrion bird. The dragon was his best scout, as well as one of his best fighters. He needed to know the best route to Sheer Cliff.

The person who was going to be there would get there soon. It wouldn't be good if he missed them because he was too slow. The boy smiled. Soon, she'd be dead, and the hopes of those whom he had fought his entire life would be dashed.

Bugsy woke up to a throbbing headache. "Where am I?" Bugsy asked. He glanced around, and realized that he was still at the Prito Resort. Then he remembered what had happened. Or, rather, he didn't. Something had hit him. He wasn't sure what, but it had apparently knocked him out cold.

He tried to sat up, and grimaced as pain shot through his back. He glanced around the room, and saw that his Pokémon were scattered around, all sleeping. Except for Scyther. Scyther was watching him in that cold, calculating manner that he was so good at doing. His first Pokémon slapped Pinsir, who was sleeping next to the hovering bug, and the beetle squealed, waking the rest of his Pokémon up. Bugsy smiled. Somehow he felt better just knowing that they were all with him.

Bugsy glanced out the window, and saw that there was still daylight outside. The door opened, and Yachne Prito stepped through. "Oh," she said, "You're awake! Thank goodness! Professor Elm has been trying to get through to you for several hours now. He says it's an emergency."

Falkner smiled at Lorelei, "Thanks for the Double Deluxe," he said, glancing around, then staring at the burger in front of him, "I just need someone to talk to." He took a deep breath, then began. "Do you remember the attack on Violet City?" he asked quietly, "What am I talking about, of course you remember it. How could you go through something like that and forget it so quickly?"

He paused for a moment, and took a sip of the soda sitting in front of him. Lorelei looked beyond Falkner, at her team keeping watch over Frocarin. Junior was stretched over a nearby garbage can, watching everything lazily, while Senior was standing over him, his arms crossed. Frocarin had managed to make friends with Smoochum and Vulithe, and the three were playing some kind of variant of tag. Haunter and Duskull, meanwhile, kept an eye on the trio, and Golem guarded a soft drink dispensr that Frocarin had already Ice Beamed three times.

Lorelei sighed, and fidgeted. She glanced around. They were on the highest floor of the Itale Retreat. They could look down all thirty-seven floors at all the other stores, and people shopping. She needed to get going to Sheer Cliff. And she needed to get there quickly.

"Well," Falkner began again, and Lorelei brought her attention back to the teen across the small table from her, "Sprout Tower was hit—no surprise there, it's the biggest thing in the whole town, aside from the gym—and, to put things simply, it's going to collapse in two weeks unless I find some way to heal the Bellsprout inside of it. The collapse of the Tower will destroy the rest of Violet City. What doesn't get destroyed will die soon enough, because all plant life within a two-mile radius of Sprout Tower will die."

Lorelei felt a stab of pity for the young man. He was barely a teenager and he already had to deal with things like this. But she really needed to get going so that she could take care of her own problems. Falkner shook his head as if trying to clear bad memories and continued, "Well," he said, "I guess the pressure got to me, because I found a gun somewhere and tried to kill myself."

Lorelei froze, one of her Johto fries halfway to her mouth. Falkner looked up at her, "Yeah," he said quietly, "I did. The gun didn't have any bullets in it, though." He sighed, "Then I remembered what you had said about Allnian. How it could heal anything living." He smiled, "After I pulled myself together enough to travel, I came here. I want to find Allnian, and I want Allnian to heal Sprout Tower. Because if Allnian doesn't, my entire town will be destroyed, and hundreds of Pokémon will die."

Bugsy squinted at the video phone's screen, and yawned. He'd just woken up from being asleep for several hours. Something had knocked him out. He wasn't sure what it was, but he knew that it would come to him later. For now, he had to talk to Professor Elm. The good Professor had insisted on talking to him at that very moment, even though he was half a world away.

Bugsy looked at the chronometer in the upper-left corner of the display, and shook his head. It was nearly midnight back in Johto. Whatever he was calling about, Professor Elm must certainly have deemed very important.

The screen flickered as the connection was made, and Elm's wearied visage appeared on the screen, his brown hair ruffled, as if he had been in some sort of a fight. "Professor?" Bugsy asked, "What's happening over there? What's so important that you call me over here in the middle of the night?"

The professor's grave face turned sour. "Things are happening all over Johto. All the different teams are acting up at the same time. The Global Police are overwhelmed. There simply aren't enough of them to keep everyone at bay. They're screaming for reinforcements from other countries, but they're all over there in Nuschantz! Besides, even if they all came back, I'm not sure that that'd be enough."

Bugsy frowned, and rubbed his eyes, "What exactly has been happening?" he asked.

The Pokémon Professor sighed. "Where do I start? Team Rocket's taken over the Radio Tower, Team Flora's taken control of Ilex Forest and won't let anyone pass through, Team Aqua's seized control of Cianwood, Team Magma's taken control of Mount Silver, a part of Team Blizzard's taken control of the Ice Caves…" Elm trailed off, "Need I go on? We've got eighteen teams, not including one that hasn't identified itself yet taking control of the Slowpoke Well, taking various locations hostage. Johto's economy has ground to a halt. Nobody can go anywhere anymore. New Bark Town is the last town in Johto that doesn't have a team attacking it. I'm certain that it's only a matter of time, though. Get back here! We need your help! You're the only gym leader that hasn't been captured. Well, Falkner hasn't been captured, but no one knows where he is. Meet with Professor Oak in Pallet Town. He's been assembling a strike team of the best trainers in Kanto to help free us over here!"

Bugsy sat there, slowly digesting all that he'd been told. He nodded slowly, then he heard a dull pounding in the background of Elm's feed. Elm looked at Bugsy nervously, gave him a weak smile in apology, then moved out of camera range.

Suddenly, there was a loud bang, Bugsy heard Elm shouting, and then something hit the cid-phone camera. The camera toppled to the floor, and Bugsy found himself looking at a white wall.

He gritted his teeth and cut the feed. "Scyther!" he yelled. He needed to get to Kanto. He had to help his home country. He had to do it now.

Lorelei looked up from her Pokedex, and frowned. "That isn't Sheer Cliff, is it?" she asked, pointing at a gently sloping hill. They were out traveling, heading for Sheer Cliff. They had been wandering for hours, having lost all of their bearings in an hour long snowstorm.

Lorelei scowled again and looked at her Pokedex as she heard a chorus of negatives from behind her. Trust the little bugger who called himself her guide to get the whole group lost. Her Pokedex was a prototype that her brother, CEO of the Altan branch of Silph company, had given her nearly a week before.

A week? Had it really been that long? Lorelei shook her head. She'd been on the road a week, and look at the messes she'd gotten herself into. When this was all over, it would be nice to have a normal journey.

She smiled and looked at the two-dimensional map in front of her. If it was correct, and they'd been following the path, and hadn't gotten lost, Sheer Cliff should have been directly in front of her. Her smile faded. If only the Pokedex had a GPS unit, then she would have been able to pinpoint her position, and go directly to Sheer Cliff.

She sighed. While the special features that were installed in the piece of hardware were very nice, she had detected enough bugs in it—both in the software and hardware—that she would suggest to her brother that they abandon the entire line.

She sighed as she felt her backpack shift slightly. Her injured Sneasel rode on her back, acting as a lookout. The poor little guy had had his Carentamous Assembly crushed by a very large, very powerful Mightyena. He hadn't had a chance. Even if he'd been able to defeat the Mightyena, there would have been three additional Pokémon for him to defeat as well. Frocarin had proven to be an admirable scout, and had actually predicted the blizzard that had gotten them off track. If he'd been able to communicate that clearly to them, however, she would have been more impressed. As it was, everything was covered with a fresh layer of snow, and no one could spot any landmarks.

Vulithe, on the other hand, stayed with her, and had proven to be the most vital element of her team. Time and again it had defeated Pokemon that threatened her, and time and again they came back in larger numbers. Duskull, Haunter, and Golem had all been recalled, as they all couldn't stand the cold.

She sighed and shook her head, and squinted at the map again. "Lukas!" she called behind her, "Come up here!" the little brat was at her side in an instant.

Here they were. Four lost and weary souls, looking for a tall cliff that went straight up nearly a mile into the air. Lost, without food, water, other supplies, and the knowledge of where exactly they were. Or, at least, Lorelei didn't know.

"Where are we?" she demanded, pointing at the Pokedex's map. Lukas swiped at his nose, and studied the map intently for a moment.

After a long pause, Lukas looked up at her sheepishly and said, "I don't know."

It took every ounce of willpower that she had not to strangle the little bugger.

Eltan looked at the figure in front of him, this time with Ghrenda at his side. "Sir," he said, "My troops are preparing to launch an assault on the objective. It'll take less than a day. Give us thirteen hours, and we'll have completed our objective." He smiled. He knew that it would take less than that, but as it was, he'd get points for having done his job ahead of schedule.

"Good," the figure said, then turned his attention to his partner, "Ghrenda. I don't need to remind you the importance of your mission. The Board of Directors chose you personally. Do not fail us. You know the consequences if you do."

Eltan stared at his partner in shock. This whole time, Ghrenda had been hired by the Shadow Warriors? Had she been reporting to them about him behind his back? He shivered as he thought about what she must be capable of. "Yes sir," Ghrenda said quietly, bowing her head slightly before returning to her standard, completely rigid posture.

"Eltan," the figure said, turning its attention back to him, "You are hereby recalled. Go to your teleporter, and select destination Alpha Sigma Omega 9873984. They are our allies. We need you here. Something's been leaked. The rest of the major teams have laid claim to various portions of Johto. This will make our further invasion more difficult, but not yet impossible. That is all. Specter Shadow Warriors Command out." The hologram in front of Eltan winked out.

Eltan felt his knees begin to shake. He'd been a pawn. That was all. He'd only been a pawn. And now he'd be a hostage. A hostage forcing his men to comply with the Shadow Warriors, or he would die. That was what he would be. He wondered if he'd be able to escape—make it to the meeting room, where his men were waiting for him. He sneaked a glance over at Ghrenda, and found her staring at him coolly, as if reading his mind.

His heart sank. There went his last hope of escape. If he tried, Ghrenda would most likely kill him, if she were indeed a Shadow Warrior. He swallowed and went to the teleporter. Ghrenda stayed beside him the entire way, and got onto the transporter with him. He swallowed hard again. There went any chance of selecting the wrong site.

He entered the correct site and pressed the teleportation activation button. His world swirled around him in a veritable rainbow, and then there was darkness.

Steven looked up at the countryside surrounding him. It was beautiful. He'd come all the way from Johto with his Junior Trainers to help out Nuschantz, but he hadn't expected it to be this beautiful. It had pained him, leaving his gym in Claire's hands, but at least she wasn't going to take it over. Well, if she did, he'd just have to take it back when he returned to Blackthorne City.

Steven pushed his jet-black hair out of his face, and walked forward, glancing around, trying to find the person he'd been told to meet. A somebody Verin? What was it, Lefar Verin? Yeah, that was it. He glanced over his shoulder and saw that his Aggron had grabbed the last of his stuff, and his junior trainers had their baggage. He gestured towards the terminal, and hurried in, lugging three of his bags.

He frowned as he entered the building. There was the usual array of chairs, tables, and other things, but nobody was there. Well, Steven considered, that wasn't exactly true. Over in that corner was—

Steven stopped. What was Bugsy doing in Nuschantz? He'd heard that the Azalean had gone on vacation, but to Nuschantz? Didn't he realize how expensive tickets to this place were, especially now, in the tourist off-season? Well, especially now that there was an almost state of war in the country.

Bugsy looked up and spotted him, and hurried over to him. "Hey Steven," he said, "Good to see you." He paused, and glanced up at one of the many TVs that were hung in strategic places around what Steven could see of the room. "It's crazy, isn't it?"

Steven glanced up at the television, and froze. There was a map of Johto on it, and was colored in seventeen different colors. And each color corresponded to a particular team, whose insignia was placed as close as possible to the center of each team's area of influence.

"I hadn't heard anything," he said, "What's going on?"

Bugsy shook his head, "Teams are popping up all over Johto, and taking over various parts. Everybody's taking something. Even part of Team Blizzard is over there."

Steven's eyes narrowed, then grinned, "Blackthorne hasn't been overrun yet, I see," he said, glancing up at the map on the screen. "I guess that we're just better defenders than you Azaleans are."

Bugsy grinned back, and shook his head, "You know as well as I do how hard it is to get up there. I bet that whoever you've left up there is just keeping ahold of the choke points."

Steven froze, then groaned. "I left Claire in charge of defenses. If I know her, she'll be launching a counter-attack that'll leave Blackthorne pretty much defenseless I've gotta get back there." He turned back towards the door, but Bugsy's hand on his arm stopped him.

"Look," Bugsy said, "I'm going home. I can't go back to Azalea, it's being controlled by Team Terra. Even if I wanted to get back there, I'd have to face Team Geode or Team Flora. Those scientists aren't letting anyone through Ilex Forest until the battle's over. Something about protecting some kind of tree moss. I'll go straight to Blackthorne, all right? It's the only city in Johto that still has a runway and hasn't been overrun yet. New Bark Town was taken over just under an hour ago."

Steven shook his head, "Yeah, that sounds good," he muttered. "but I need to go back. The people are depending on me."

Bugsy narrowed his eyes, "People here are depending on you, too. I told them that I'd get a gym leader, and his Junior Trainers over here to defend them. If you abandon them now, I don't know what will happen. But I've got to go back. I can't leave the twins to be prisoners in Azalea. I have family at stake, Steven."

The steel-type gym leader sighed, and brushed his hair out of his face again, "Fine," he muttered, "But then you'll owe me one. By the way," he asked, "Do you know where a Lefar Verin is?"

Bugsy grinned, and pointed at a squat, balding man who was conversing with several men in Nuschantian military uniforms. "That's him. Have fun." With that, Bugsy ran out the door and onto the waiting plane.

Steven felt someone tap him on one shoulder. "Was that Bugsy?" AJ asked. The kid had volunteered to come, and had said that he'd come one way or another. When Steven had expressed doubts about how well his Sandshrew and Weedles would do, the boy had simply grinned at him.

Steven nodded slowly, "That was Bugsy. He's going back to Johto."

AJ frowned. "Too bad," Steven heard him mutter as he moved towards the Verin man, "We could have used him."

sorry it took so long, guys. I know that you (Redemmo, anyway) were really looking forward to this. Well, I've finished it over on SPP Forums forums), and I'm more than halfway through the next fic in the series, and there's also a spin-off to this going. Not sure if I mentioned the Bugsy Spin-off over here, but no, it's not that one.

hopefully this time I'll be able to get a journey fic going that'll stay a journey fic for most of it. Unlike this little attempt at journey ficdom...:D


	14. The Pieces are Moving

Gertal looked over his men, over fifteen hundred strong, and smiled to himself. This was a more than ample force with which to take a resort or two, or to destroy every resort in the entire country if that had been his intentions. Of course, it was miniscule in scale compared to armies from countries such as Alto, Tintia, and Engara, but it would have to do.

He and his men had spent most of the previous ten hours discussing tactics. He, personally, had wondered long after he was supposed to have gone to take a nap how Eltan could possibly have turned on him. He had been his most trusted advisor, and now the leader of Team Blizzard was on the run from Eltan.

Nearly the entire force that he would use to destroy Eltan and whomever followed him stood in the large auditorium next to the large, shielded double doors that opened onto the snowy wilderness that waited just outside. Some waited by saddled equines, and others had fierce canines by their sides. Gertal smiled. These men would soon march out those doors and undo the damage that Eltan had done in just a short period of time.

For starters, they would march against the Hampton Haven, and leave it in the hands of the Resorters while the men kept marching on Eltan's main attack force. Gertal glanced around. A makeshift podium with a microphone had been set up to allow him to speak to all of the men at once. His men looked expectantly up at the podium upon which he stood, and waited for his pre-battle speech.

"Ladies and Gentlemen," he said slowly, then paused as feedback screeched through the room's speakers. He grimaced, and adjusted his microphone. "Ladies and gentlemen," he began again, "Less than twelve hours ago, our fellow brothers began an uprising against us." He paused, and waited for the angered muttering to die down, then once again, he began to speak.

"They were led by our very own Eltan, a man whom you and I have more than once trusted our very lives to. He wants nothing less than complete domination of the entire country, if not the continent." Gertal looked at the technicians in the very back of the room, to make sure that they thought everything—that was technical in nature, anyway—was as it should be. They gave him a thumbs-up, and he continued. "And so here we are, faced with the betrayal from within, and the sudden influx from without of international Pokemon trainers, who have sworn to destroy Team Blizzard forever."

He paused as the crowd reacted to his news, and once the mutterings had ceased, he began again, "As most of you know, I formed Team Blizzard as a political group, to try to change the way our country governs itself. It has become clear to me now, however, that because of Eltan, we will be treated like such groups as Team Rocket, Team Aqua, Team Magma, and Team Aero. I am ashamed to admit that because of Eltan, we are, in some ways, like some of them."

There was dead silence in the room, and Gertal began pacing back and forth in front of the podium, the microphone on his lapel carrying his words to the assembled Blizzards, "That is why we must act now. Unless we destroy Eltan and his followers, we too will be hunted down and either destroyed or jailed. This leaves us with but two options. Stay and hope that Eltan is defeated, or march out and defeat him ourselves. If we stay here and wait, it is a certainty that we will be destroyed by Eltan. However, if we march out and destroy Eltan, the Resorters and their international allies will destroy us."

Gertal felt tears coming to his eyes again, but kept them from falling, "Ladies and gentlemen, we face a hard choice, and I believe that I have made the right one. We will not stop marching, we will not rest until Eltan is defeated. And once that happens, Team Blizzard as we know it will cease to exist. Our armies will disband, our bases forfeited, and any and all information that we have will be turned over to the Resorters. In short, we will surrender."

There were some gasps out in the audience, and more than a few angry grumblings. "I did not come to this decision lightly," Gertal said, slightly louder than before to get everyone's attention, "But if we do not do this, I guarantee you that we will all be destroyed. This is our best hope for our cause. This does not mean that our nomadic way of life will disappear, only that it will take a temporary setback."

He took a deep breath, and asked, "If any of you think that this is the wrong thing to do, speak now." He looked out over the audience, and watched them shift uncomfortably, but nobody raised their hand. Gertal felt as if a weight had been lifted off of his heart. "Then we ride, brothers. We ride to war. Not in hope for victory for ourselves, but for the greater good. We will be outnumbered three to one by Eltan's troops alone. While that means that we must choose our battles very carefully, we will be victorious, I can guarantee you that. And I DO have a plan to destroy him." He stepped back from the center of the podium, as a holographic projector came alive, with a map of Nuschantz upon it.

"As you can see, Eltan has moved quickly. Within these past eight hours, he has taken the Hudson Resort and the Hampton Haven, and has left just enough men behind to keep them safe from a light attack from the Resorters. His main force, however, is currently marching on Sheer Cliff. As of right now, we have no idea why. We will split our forces to take both the Hampton and Hudson Resorts, but we will also be taking a larger force," he looked out over the men assembled, and swept his hand expansively over the middle group, "This force will march on Sheer Cliff, but will wait to attack until the other two wings catch up with them. Once again, we do not know what he plans to do at Sheer Cliff, but I doubt that it's anything good, and we cannot let him accomplish it. Are you with me?" he shouted his question, and his men responded in kind.

Gertal's eyes glittered. Eltan had hijacked his team, and thought that he could do what he pleased with it? The young man would pay for his arrogance. He would pay for it dearly.

Eltan looked around the cubic gray room in fear. He wasn't able to tell where anything was. It was just four walls, a ceiling and a floor. There was nothing in the room besides him. Well, Ghrenda had been there, but they had remote teleported her away.

Then a noise cut into his thoughts. It was the sound of remote teleportation. He looked up quickly just to see a short man in a simple black business suit standing there. He was basically of average features. If Eltan had run into him on the street, he wouldn't have given him a second thought. "Eltan," the man said, smiling slightly, "I'm the Director."

Eltan felt a chill run down his spine. He had heard rumors of the Director. A man with terrible power far beyond belief. He was someone that even the leaders of Specter Company were afraid of. He didn't know much beyond that, but knew that he was right to be terrified. He swallowed and stood up a little straighter. "Hello sir," he said in a shaky voice, "I'm—"

"Eltan, yes," the Director said, cutting him off. He sounded annoyed, "You've failed us in Nuschantz, you know. One of the requirements for The Day of Lont is that Allnian, Ho-oh, and Lugia be reunited. We were nearly there, and then you let Gertal escape! If he hadn't escaped, the Day of Lont would be several years closer! You slimy, wretched quisling," the Director sneered.

Eltan was cowering, trying to get as far away from this strange and terrifying man. "But you are not without your uses," The Director said in a somewhat softer tone, "You will have one last chance. If you fail us in this, however, you will die."

Eltan shivered at the casualness that The Director said the words, and managed to get out, "Anything, sir! Anything!"

The Director smiled. "Very well. I thought you would say that. One of your inferiors is having trouble over in Johto, keeping control of the Ice Caves. I don't see what's so spectacular about them, but the Johtans make such a big deal about them." He trailed off, as in deep in thought, then his attention snapped back to Eltan so abruptly that the Blizzard actually flinched. "You will go to Johto," The Director said coldly, "And you will ensure that the Ice Caves are held long enough for—" he paused, "you will ensure that the Ice Caves are held. Or your life is forfeit."

Giovanni was mad. Very mad. He was almost mad enough to spit nails. If he had had any left in his mouth. He and his men had been assigned to protect the Hampton Haven, and he had been forced to abandon it. True, he had been facing at least five thousand men, and every one of them were better equipped and better trained than his men, but he was still mad about it. And he would make them pay.

Very soon, in fact, they would pay. His scouts, the ones that hadn't been caught and killed, had reported that the main Blizzard force had moved on, leaving just under three hundred men to guard the resort. Of course, Giovanni now had only about four hundred, but he was reasonably sure that he'd be able to take them on.

The main thing that had surprised Giovanni and his men had been their tactics. They had used Light Screens and Reflect Screens to prevent most damage to their men. Giovanni and his men had neither of those things. So, of course, it had been a massacre. Fortunately, he had been able to get most of his men out.

This time he would learn from his mistake. He had gone to each of his lieutenants and had found every Pokémon that could put up either a Reflect screen or a Light Screen, and had conscripted them to do that very thing. He had also organized his men into various divisions, according to type, rather than according to who the Pokémon belonged to. He probably should have done that in the first place, but there was no changing things now.

Especially because they were mere minutes away from an attack on the Hampton Haven. Giovanni had sworn to protect the resort, and would stand by his word. He had positioned his men into three wings, and had gotten them settled in. He would have preferred to wait a day longer, but he had gotten word of Blizzard reinforcements marching towards the Haven. He had a window of only a matter of hours to take the resort and get its defenses in place.

So here he was, climbing up to the top of a ridge that overlooked the Hampton Haven. He peeked up over the crest of the hill, and nearly had his head vaporized by an Ice Beam that flew by two inches from his face.

Giovanni jerked his head down and glared at his subordinate. "How did they do that?" he demanded, but the young man didn't have time to respond before reports were coming in over his radio that there was significant Psionic interference among the troops. Some had even apparently been taken over by whatever Psychics were down in the Hampton. He grabbed his radio, "fall back," he said quickly.

Giovanni grimaced. Once again the Nuschantians had devised a way to defeat him. He needed to withdraw, figure out what exactly was going on, and how to beat it. By that time, he knew, his window for taking the Hampton Haven would be closed. And he would have failed the Nuschantians he had sworn to protect.

Unfortunately, he didn't see any way for him to move in on the Hampton Haven any time in the immediate future. That meant that he would need to make a strategic retreat. Suddenly, he began to hear a voice in his head, telling him to stand up, and to wave his hands.

Giovanni shook it off. He knew that if he did that, he'd be killed. It had to be the Psionic interference he'd been told about. Somehow they had gotten their Psychics to try to take over his men's minds. He grabbed his radio, but moved slowly, as if in a dream, "Psychic division, where are you?" he demanded, feeling is ability to resist the voice begin to sharply decline.

From his left, he heard a scream, and glanced over to see one of his men tumbling down the back side of the hill, a massive hole passing through all the way through him, and suddenly the voice in his head was insignificant. His eyes narrowed. They had killed one of his men. He could still hear the voice, but he didn't care about it anymore.

A silent rage came over him, and he didn't care about anything but avenging his fallen comrade mattered to him. With a roar, he pulled out his pistol, leaped up, and charged down the hill, releasing his Pokémon as he ran. His men, stunned, began to follow his example.

For some reason, the people in the Hampton Haven didn't respond until he was nearly halfway down the hill, and by then, it was all over. By that time, Giovanni's men had gotten their Light Screens and Reflect Screens up, and the first few scattered Ice Beams merely reflected off and into the sky, dissipating high in the atmosphere.

The return fire from Giovanni's troops, however, met little resistance. As Giovanni would surmise later, the Blizzards had expected him to retreat under the Psionic Assault, and had not erected any defensive screens. By the time that the screens were put up, Giovanni's attack that surprised even his own men was fully underway, and several of his men and Pokémon were actually under the Psionic Defensive screens.

Giovanni glanced to his right, and saw a Blizzard. With all the calm of a practiced soldier, he calmly brought his pistol over and fired. He wasn't exactly sure where he was, but all he knew was that the murderous rage that had sent him flying down the hill was gone. He couldn't explain it, but somehow, he wasn't operating on rage, now, he was operating on pure skill and instinct. He had somehow gotten into the tunnels that ranged below the resort that he and his men had become very familiar with.

The formerly plush hallways had been stripped to the bare walls and bare floors, and bright lights had been shining behind him, casting a shadow into the hallway, before he'd shot them out. He did have a problem, however. He was running out of ammunition. He had picked up a Blizzard pistol, but it only had a few shots. Additionally, he'd been separated from his entire team, except for his Nidoking and queen. They were watching his back. He was responsible for the front arc.

Giovanni raised his pistol and moved forward, towards a closed door. He leaned against it and listened. He could hear men inside talking in low voices, and the distinctive sound of magazines being slammed into guns.

He grimaced, and looked at his gun. Unless he had some kind of advantage, he knew he wouldn't be able to do anything of value. He had come here because it was the main jail facility, and the main armory as well. If any Nuschantian prisoners were still held at the Hampton Haven, they would be held here.

He glanced at his two ground types, and grinned. He DID have an advantage, he realized, after all.

Tenloss glanced over at Holen, both armed to the teeth, and fully half the security force that had been assigned to the Nuschantian prisoners. They had not been given Pokemon, because their superiors had assured them that the weaponry in the adjoining armory would be more than enough to take care of anything that came their way.

"They're right outside, right?" Tenloss asked Holen, who was standing behind a bank of camera monitors.

Holen nodded, "Yeah, they were, before they shot the camera out."

Then, everything changed. The door burst open, and a huge fist retracted from the opening, and to one side of the door. Instantly, dozens, if not hundreds, of bullets roared through the doorway, missing the hand by centimeters. The bullet casings fell onto the floor, the air became permeated with gunpowder, and the Blizzards' ears began to ring from the sheer amount of noise that permeated the very air of the room.

Then the sand entered the room. From either side of the doorway, a massive figure suddenly appeared, and both sprayed sand into the eyes of the gunners. Instinctively, they stopped firing and raised their hands to their eyes. Tenloss did have a small bit of reassurance in that he heard a roar of pain.

But his rejoicing was short-lived, and was killed completely by the first gunshot and Holen's screams. There were more shots, and more screaming. Tenloss fired wildly, but only heard the sound of exploding circuitry. Then one more shot that wasn't from his gun sounded, and then all there was was pain.

Giovanni stood over the bodies of the four Blizzards, pointing his gun at each of them in succession. "Get in here," he called over his shoulder, and his two hulking Pokemon entered the room. Nidoking, he noticed, was favoring his left leg. "Keep an eye on 'em," he said quietly, "I'm not sure if they're totally dead. If any are still alive and so much as look at you wrong, make sure that they're dead."

They both nodded, and Giovanni moved to the soundproof door beyond which, he knew, the prisoners were kept. He opened the door, and didn't think about until later that it was unlocked, and walked through.

From then on, until the end of his life, he would never forget the overjoyed cries of the Nuschantian prisoners.

Giovanni looked up from the rifle he had commandeered from the arms locker that was now several stories beneath his feet. He'd given orders that every Nuschantian and Kantan be armed with the weapons in the locker, in order to help fend off the Blizzard's second wave, which would come over the crest of the hill he was facing any second.

He had gotten one gun from the armory that he liked particularly. It was a pistol that had a fifty-bullet clip, a laser sight to help him aim, electric darts that acted as ranged tazers, and many other bells and whistles. He made a mental note to ask the Nuschantians later if he could keep it.

He shook his head, and brought himself back to the present. The Blizzards were coming up over the hill. He waited as the first rounds of the defenders roared in towards the Blizzards, and, for some reason, struck Psionic Barriers only five feet from their targets.

And there weren't many targets, either. Giovanni frowned. There were only five people that had come over the hill. And they were waving a white flag. And it looked like they only had a Jynx with them.

He grabbed his radio, "Hold you fire," he said, "Let 'em approach. Biggs, you and your squad meet up with me at the northwest corner of what used to be the terminal for the ice runway."

The Blizzard yawned. It was a quiet night. The Nuschantians had barely managed to mount a defense against the lightning attack that he had led nearly three hours before. The Hudson Resort was firmly in the hands of Team Blizzard, and would stay that way, as long as he had a say in it.

True, he only had about a hundred men, but that would be good enough to defeat nearly any force the Nuschantians threw at him, unless they left one of their cities vulnerable to an attack.

He had heard that the Loyalists were planning to attack him, but he wasn't worried. By the time that they organized an attack, Eltan and Ghrenda would be finished with their plan, and he would have reinforcements being sent to him again.

He glanced out towards the mountain that towered over the Resort, and frowned. Was that movement? It was probably just a Piloswine or something. He glanced over his shoulder at the main resort building. The lights were on, and the sounds of celebration were coming from inside.

He stamped his feet, wishing he were inside, away from the cold. He had just had to volunteer for guard duty, hadn't he? He glanced at his chronometer. Five more minutes, and he'd be relieved. Then he'd be able to relax for the rest of the night.

He looked up at the building, and smiled. It was at least ten stories high, and the size of four Indigo League Colosseums. He could almost imagine the soft beds that waited for him inside. It wouldn't be long before he'd be able to get some well-earned sleep.

Or so he thought. He never saw or heard the Psybeam the struck him in the back of the head. It burned literally through his brain, and it felt as if someone was twisting his brain inside out. The sheer pain of the sudden assault made him cry out unconsciously, and the impact sent him sprawling, limp to the ground. The Jynx that had fired the attack slipped back into hiding, waiting for the inevitable. Sooner or later, someone would come out to see why the man had screamed.

It did not take long. Several Blizzards, obviously drunk, staggered out of the main hostel, and went over to their comrade. The Jynx shifted, preparing to teleport, but then they closed the door behind themselves. It growled to itself in frustration. Despite learning Teleport from the TM she'd been given, she still couldn't teleport through walls, or even glass. She'd just have to wait. When the drunk Blizzards saw the man on the ground, they at first laughed amongst themselves, then tried to pick him up.

The Blizzard at the unconscious man's head jerked his hands away, and stared at them. They were covered in blood. Then, the Blizzard who had went around to the man's head froze, and yelled for help. Immediately, about a dozen more Blizzards came out the door, leaving it ajar. Immediately, the Jynx teleported through the door, and began its Blizzard Technique. That was the signal to begin.

Dozens of men leaped up from behind boulders, crests of snow, and even some of the outbuildings that weren't being used. They all charged the main building of the Hudson Resort. There was the characteristic sound of Pokemon being released, and then the size of the attacking force more than quadrupled.

The drunk men looked up, startled, and reached for their belts, but were cut down by the first volley of Ice Beams before they could get very far. The men rushing out of the Hotel managed to get several Pokemon released before they were Psybeamed in the back by the Jynx that had teleported inside the main building.

The rebel Blizzard Pokemon put up a valiant fight, but they were outmatched in sheer numbers, and were swept up or trampled by the onrushing Loyalist Pokemon. The Loyalist Pokemon poured through the door, and overwhelmed the first floor of the building almost immediately, but faced heavy resistance when they tried to go up the stairs.

An Aggron, a Medicham, and a Houndoom held at bay the torrents of Sneasel, Jynx, and Delibirds trying to rush up the stairs with a flurry of Swifts, Psychics, and Flamethrowers, but they too were pushed back, slowly but inexorably.

At another staircase, the rebel Blizzards launched a counter-attack with several Glalie, Sneasel, Lapras, and Walrein, but were pushed back up the staircase within minutes, only to be trapped by a contingent of Loyalist Pokemon that had broken past the rebel Blizzards on another staircase.

There was no stopping the Loyalist Pokemon from taking the entire building. They refused to let the Rebel Blizzards stop for a moment to catch their breath, and instead pushed onwards, until the last of the rebel Blizzards, cornered on the roof, surrendered unconditionally.

Half an hour later, Belsa, the woman Gertal himself had picked for the raid, stood on the roof, feeling the wind biting into her skin, and stared at the pitiful half-dozen rebel humans and the dozen rebel Pokemon that were still conscious from the attack. Among them were the Medicham, Aggron, and Houndoom who had so bravely defended the second-story staircase.

Belsa looked at them for a moment, and they glared back. She had to admit, she was impressed with them, but they had fought against her. They were her enemies. It was a shame that her enemies had men, women, and Pokemon such as them fighting for them.

She glanced at her lieutenant, and asked, "Have you located the Nuschantians?" she asked quietly, turning from the prisoners.

"Yes sir," the young man replied, "They were locked in the building's cellar. What are your orders, ma'am?" he asked.

She smiled. "Release them, put the rebels down there, and give the key to the Nuschantians. Once that's done, prepare to move out. Apparently the Kantans took over the Hampton, and we managed to convince them that we didn't want it, so we're meeting up with the other strike force. We're both going to march on to Sheer Cliff as soon as we possibly can." She shook her head, "It seems as if everyone is converging there. I wonder if there is some purpose in that, or if it is the place where we will all destroy one another to the last man."

The Director glanced up at the woman standing in front of his desk. "Giovanni has proved very susceptible to Psionic suggestion." He said, smiling. "His attack on the Hampton Haven has certainly proven that."

The woman nodded, "Yes, he certainly has. Unfortunately, The Project couldn't maintain contact with him and keep himself from being detected once both sides' Psionic screens were up. The technicians recommend an upgrade."

The Director smiled, and took the report. "If The Project isn't able to operate under that kind of pressure, it won't be any good on the battlefield. Contact the scientists on Cinnabar, and tell them that they're recalled. We need them to work on an improved version of their project." He glanced at the folder, then up at the woman. "What did they call it, again?"

The woman smiled, "Mewtwo, sir. They called it Mewtwo." 


	15. And Now We have Come To

Elizabeth Shelby walked around the camp, and stared up at Sheer Cliff, looming over their camp, despite its being three miles away. It was an impressive piece of geology. On the top, supposedly, the legendary Allnian lived. She had been sent by the Specter Shadow Warrior contingent to capture Allnian. Five regular squads of AA men with twenty men each, and the special squad. She was actually in charge of the special squad, but, because of her training, she had been put in charge of the entire crew.

She had gotten word that both factions of Blizzards were running headlong towards her, and that made her very unhappy. Ghrenda had been supposed to take care of the Blizzards. Both the sniveling idiot Eltan and the only warrior she actually respected in this frozen wasteland, Gertal. She had to admit that she admired the leader of Team Blizzard, and almost wished that she could recruit him into the ranks of the Specter Shadow Warriors. But she knew, based on the profile she'd read of him, that he'd never join them.

But that hadn't been her purpose in coming here. Her purpose, one that had been hidden from Eltan, was to capture Allnian. After all, she was the ultimate weapon. She could spread disease upon the Shadow Warriors' enemies, and heal the Shadow Warriors at practically the same time. The only problem was that Allnian was extremely powerful, and not easily controlled.

But that wouldn't be a problem anymore. Not with the special Pokemon she had brought with her from Blackdawn. Allnian would be hers within two days. As soon as they found that blasted trio of Nuschantian Guardians.

Lorelei glanced at her Pokedex, and then looked ahead, towards the pillar of rock that rose sharply out of the ground. She grimaced. There it was. Sheer Cliff. Her entire trip had culminated in this single event. And now, it was just over the next hill. She paused. With any luck, she'd be able to make it to the top of the cliff in short order. She shook her head. It just didn't seem possible. It had taken her a long time and a lot of sacrifices to get to this point.

Lorelei felt her eyes begin to tear up as she remembered the Pokemon that had died while she had made this journey. She would never forget the Geodude and Duskull that she had lost in the Violet City attack. Never. She had sent them into battle, knowing full well the dangers. And in so doing, she had lost them. And their sacrifices hadn't made one bit of difference.

As if sensing her mood, she felt a paw stroke her hair. She smiled, tears in her eyes, and clasped the appendage. It belonged to Junior, of course, and was her only good hand. Most of her left arm was gone, as well as her Carentamous Assembly, the organ within all Pokemon that made their special attacks possible. That, in fact, was why Lorelei had come to Nuschantz.

Lukas walked up beside her and looked up at her expectantly, "Are you okay?" he asked, then grinned, "Or are you chickening out?" She glared at him, took a deep breath, and walked forward, to the crest of the hill.

The sight that met her eyes made her stop, growl, and whirl on her guide. "Lukas, Sheer Cliff has a teleporter station too?" she demanded, then whirled back to the sight that she had seen when she had come over the hill. A vast complex of buildings surrounded the bottom of Sheer Cliff, and she knew that where that many buildings were gathered together in Nuschantz, there had to be a teleportation station somewhere in the mix. "And don't tell me that we walked because it's more fun!" she snarled.

The boy seemed to shrink before her eyes, and didn't say a word, and stepped back. Lorelei's eyes narrowed, and she whirled back towards Sheer Cliff with a snarl. She couldn't believe it. The little wretch had wasted entire days of time that she could have spent traveling back to Kanto just because he thought that it was more fun to walk.

She heard Junior whine plaintively from her backpack, but she ignored her. Vulithe started to come close to her, but Frocarin forced the well-intentioned Pokemon away from her. It was probably a good thing, too. With the mood that she was in, there was no telling what she would have done. Golem, Senior, Duskull and Haunter knew from experiences past the same thing that Frocarin knew instinctively. And that was that attracting her attention when she was in this kind of a rage was a bad idea.

Lorelei ran down the hill and towards the nearest of the buildings, and burst through the door. She wasn't exactly sure what she expected, but what greeted her certainly wasn't it.

Beyond a greeting desk where a female teenager that probably made minimum wage sat, there was a museum. But it wasn't any old museum. It was a museum dedicated to Allnian. She stared, and walked forward, ignoring the young woman's proffered hand.

She glanced around, and saw that the museum extended for a long ways. She grimaced, and, realizing that she needed as much help as possible, started reading.

Two hours later, she was done reading, but didn't know that much more about Allnian. She had already known that Allnian was a legendary from Alto, but had at some time and for an unknown reason, had come to Nuschantz. She had learned a little bit more about the trio of quasi-legendaries that were essentially Allnian's lieutenants.

The older two, Austrealis and Borealis, were the female and male parents respectively of the third lieutenant, Auroura. It was said that only someone who had seen a Pokemon with a power and rarity level that was enough to classify the creature as a legendary Pokemon would be able to see them.

Lorelei wasn't sure if she qualified or not. That monstrosity that had appeared over the skies of Violet City probably counted, but she couldn't be sure. She sighed and wondered if she should give up right then.

She felt someone's hand on her shoulder, and heard Falkner's voice. "Lorelei, you've got to get some sleep. I was going to remind you once we got here, but you haven't slept for a long time. Please, get some rest."

Lorelei shook her head. "No," she insisted stubbornly, "I've gotta find Allnian."

Falkner sighed. "Look, I know a lot about bird types, all right? My family does too. We're supposed to be the experts in that, remember? Here's the deal. I get a conference call with my family about Allnian AFTER you get some rest. Deal?"

Lorelei made a face at him,. Then sighed. "Fine," she muttered. "Deal.

The temporal agent peered over the hill, and immediately spotted the cluster of buildings that surrounded the bottom of Sheer Cliff. It would not be long now. He glanced down at his belt, and made sure that his gun was fully charged. When everything began, he'd only have a few moments to react. His partner was somewhere on the other side of Sheer Cliff, because they weren't quite sure where the Dark Master would come from. If they could stop her here, then their mission would be complete.

The agent ran a hand through his black hair and glanced around. He was in a small ice cave, one that was impossible to see unless you were very close and looking for it. It was here that he would wait for the Dark Queen, and from here, he would rush out to attempt to kill her.

He knew that once the battle began, he'd have only seconds to kill her before it was too late, and he knew that he'd have to kill her Pokemon too. If he didn't, then he would have failed, and the world would once again be the place that he had come from. He did not want that to happen. It couldn't happen.

He HAD to succeed.

Devon grimaced and looked up. Her captor loomed over her threateningly. She sighed and kept moving. Her captor had been hounding her like this for some time now. He was a human. A short, squat human who didn't seem to be affected by the cold. When she had asked him who he was, he had only responded that he was a nomad. She shook her head and kept moving. He didn't speak Kantan, but she had managed to understand from his gestures and what little Nuschantian she knew something about a queen, and a sacrifice. She had a sudden feeling about what the sacrifice would be.

The nomad barked out a quick word that experience told her meant that it was time for her to stop. He passed her some kind of water container, made out of some kind of skin. She accepted it gratefully and took a drink.

The liquid's sharp, biting sensation brought her back from the edge of sleep, where she now realized she had nearly fallen. She glanced back at the nomad, who was looking at her, probably trying to be impassive, but failing miserably.

His curiosity was evident upon his wrinkled face. He was obviously an old one, and the scars that showed on the few exposed areas of his dark skin revealed that it had been a bitter life. The strange, almost leather-like clothes that he wore surprisingly light, but kept out the cold extremely well. She glanced down at the brown coat he had given her, and moved her fingers over it.

That illicited a laugh from the man. She jerked her head up, expecting him to do anything. She was a very suspicious young woman. She'd had to be. Alto was, after all, a very important stepping stone for any invasion of Tintia, and, from there, Kanto and the other so-called "civilized" countries.

When she had explained this to him as best he could, he had looked at her strangely. Then he had treated her as something close to royalty when she tried to explain further about why she had to get back to Alto. He had something about a great bird, she thought. That was the only reason that she didn't set off on her own.

Well, that, and that wicked-looking knife he kept within easy reach.

Lorelei was first aware that something was wrong when she realized that she was no longer in a heated building. The second was when she realized that she was almost a foot off the ground. Something was carrying her. She couldn't see what, but she thought that she could feel something that felt pretty close to teeth gripping her light shirt.

With a sudden jerk, she wrenched herself out of whatever was holding her, ripping half of the back of her shirt off in the process, and found herself in a snowdrift. If there had been any part of her that hadn't been awake before, she was certainly awake now. She whirled around, and found herself staring into a tooth filled with sharp teeth. Her first instinct was to beat the living daylights out of it (even though it was in the middle of the night), but she restrained herself when she noticed two, larger figures behind the small but no less threatening figure in front of her.

She took a moment to analyze the situation before getting to her feet. Directly in front of her was a strangely cat-like creature covered in white and light blue along its torso, back, and hips, with black fur running down its legs, tail, and across its chest, with streaks of silver running vertically down at regular intervals. Its face, however, was a dark purple, with spots of dark green, light brown, bright white, and many colors that were nearly the same speckled across its face.

"The human delays us." came an annoyed but unmistakably masculine growling voice from another cat, extremely dark, with streaks of white and silver running along its length and face, at least twice the size of the first cat. He stood to the left of the strange cat that stood in front of her, and his muscles rippled beneath his skin, clearly built for sheer power. "I told you I should have frozen her."

Lorelei's hackles rose, and opened her mouth to retort, but before she could, a soft, feminine voice answered the male voice, "And I told you," Lorelei shifted her gaze to the right of the cat that had carried her, and to the creature that was talking. Where the second cat had been tall, menacing, and looked like it could take on an entire army at once, this creature was small, supple, and looked extremely agile. If the voice was any indication, this was a female. She had surprisingly brightly colored compared to the other two. She was entirely white and light blue, although her tail was a dark gray, with only one strip of light blue running down its length. "That we should have explained the situation to her. I'm sure that she would have come of her own volition."

Lorelei frowned and exclaimed, "Could you all NOT talk about me as if I'm not here, and tell me who to battle first?" she reached to her belt for her Pokeballs, and her eyes widened as she realized that they were no longer there.

"Yeah," the creature that had carried her said, nodding its head, "It's REALLY annyoing." This one's voice, if this species were the same as humans, was definitely a LOT younger than the other two. And definitely male.

The smallest of the trio noticed her movement, and replied quietly, "We could not take your team, I'm afraid." she pointedly ignored the young-sounding Pokemon, "All Pokeballs have a trace metallic element that She traces. Once a Pokemon is caught by a Pokeball, the Pokemon have the element in their system as well. That's how they're kept under control. If She knew that you had left, she would use all of her resources to destroy you."

Lorelei frowned. "Me?" she asked quietly, "What's so special about me?"

The large cat answered before anyone else could. "You're an Elite. That's why we have to prevent Her from making contact with you. She already has two Elites with her. If she got her hands on you..." he trailed off.

Lorelei frowned. "Who is this 'She' and 'Her' you keep talking about?" she demanded.

The three exchanged glances. "You really do not know?" the female asked, sounding a little uneasy. Lorelei shook her head. The female moved her lips in what could only be called an attempt at a smile. It looked more like a snarl to Lorelei, though. "She is Allnian. If she were ever to be free again, she would kill us all. And then you humans would have a tough time of it."

Lorelei frowned. "So...how do I get Allnian to heal Sneasel?" she demanded. "Do I defeat her in combat or something?"

The female responded again, "Young human, maybe I haven't made myself clear. We are here to prevent you from being in ANY contact with Her whatsoever. I'm afraid that your Sneasel will have to continue as it is to the end of its days."

Lorelei looked around the cave that the giant cats had brought her to. "What is this place?" she demanded.

"It his the Master's cave," The medium felinoid that had introduced itself as Austrealis purred. "We shall take you to him in due time, but first, there is much history for you to know."

Lorelei's eyes shifted between the three cats, knowingfull well that every one of them could rip her apart. And, without her Pokemon, there was no way that she'd be able to stand against them. Not that she would have been able to before, but...She looked up at the cat-like Pokemon. "Go ahead," she said quietly.

Austrealis smiled, and ran one of her paws over her light-colored fur. "We shall begin at the beginning," she said quietly, "Long ago, humans were the only creatures on this planet, except for a weaker version of us Pokemon. MUCH weaker. We didn't even have any powers. Back then, we were known as 'animals.' The histories aren't very specific about this time period, but apparently mankind is approximately what it is like today. Then something happened. Something so clataclysmic that it changed the very shape of the world, and wiped out every living thing that walked upon it.."

Lorelei blinked. "Why haven't I heard about this before?" she demanded.

Austrealis smiled. "My dear, because the world was created anew. It is hard to explain, but the Ascended Ones—you know them as the Titans—created the world over. Everything that you humans had done, they knew, would only ultimately lead to your own destruction once more. So, they wiped the slate clean, so to speak. They made a new world, an entirely new race of humans, and more 'animals.' However, this time, they gave the 'animals' special powers, something to unie the humans against in the beginning, so that the humans would not wipe each other out once more. The Ascended Ones then sent down guardians to protect the world from utter warfare, and from the Pokemon or humans from wiping the others out. You know them as Legendaries."

Lorelei frowned, letting all the information sink in. "Wait a minute, " she said slowly, "I remember a poem that Devon Harding wrote about them. Something about there being 40 Titans total, 20 Pokemon, 20 human?"

Austrealis nodded sagely. "That is correct, " she said slowly. "There are forty, and it is split like that, but my story is not yet complete. The legendaries, you see, were entrusted with great power. There is a saying, or at least was, among the old humans. That saying was 'power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.'"

"That certainly proved true," the large, dark feline that had introduced himself as Borealis rumbled. "For one of the Titans themselves turned against the others in secret. He traveled to your world and set about corrupting the Protectors—legendaries. When he believed that he had enough on his side, he launched a massive campaing against the other Protectors. Billions of Pokemon and humans were killed in the war. Then, in a final battle, the Titans themselves came down to this world, and fought side by side with those still loyal to them. But it was not enough. The Dark Titan, a creature known as Lokrye, was simply too powerful. All seemed lost for the world, but Lokrye didn't count on humans. In his mind, Pokemon were so powerful that mankind wouldn't dare attack them."

Then the small, youngest creature, Lorelei thought his name was Aurora, spoke up. "This is my favorite part. The Protectors, that's us, went to the humans and told them that after Lokrye was done with them, that he would go after them. The humans took up what limited arms they had, and joined the battle, led by Gerahid the Invulnerable."

"Meanwhile," Austrealis picked up smoothly, "Lokrye had killed all twenty of the human titans, and was concentrating all of his forces on the Protectors and the twenty Pokemon titans. Gerahid and his men swept in with a flanking maneuver, and decimated Lokrye's forces. Gerahid himself seemed to be invulnerable, and that is why he was given that name. He fought all the way up to Lokrye, and tried to fight him, but Gerahid's mighty axe was no match for Lokrye's power. With the last ounce of his strength, he picked up one of the human titans' weapons—we're not quite what kidn of weapon it was—and hurled it at Lokrye. Somehow, this drained Lokrye's power temporarily enough for the Pokemon Titans to banish him from this planet, and to a nether-dimension, as your scientists would call it, I'm sure."

"Lokrye's forces were nothing without their leader, and quickly surrendered, and scattered to the most remote places of the world to hide from the Protectors and the Titans," Borealis added. "There they stayed, until nearly two hundred years ago, Lokrye made a bid for escape from his prison. He would have succeeded, but another Gerahid, and a troop of young men and women known as the Gamma Legends defeated Lokrye, and sent him back to his prison. But, unfortunately, this only delayed matters. Lokrye WILL escape. It's only a matter of time."

"Yeah," the youthful Aurora cut in, "But we'll be ready for him, won't we, dad?"

"Yes," Borealis rumbled, "We will be ready for him. We have rebuilt the Human Titans from the Elites that popped up from time to time. There are now seventeen Titans. We need you to be an eighteenth, and destroy Allnian."

Lorelei frowned. "I don't get it. What does Allnian have to do with all of this?"

The three looked at each other, uncomfortably, and Austrealis answered her after an awkward pause. "Allnian was Lokrye's chief executioner, and oversaw the executions of billions of Pokemon and humans. Allnian wasn't a healer, as you Altans mistakenly believe. Allnian is the single most dangerous plague to ever have been created by the Titans."

Lorelei shook her head. "I don't know," she said slowly, "It's a bit of a stretch for me," she said, "But does being a Titan give me my own parking space wherever I work?"

Borealis shook his head. "Lorelei, if you choose to be a Titan, you will forfeit this life, and ascend to a higher plane of existence. You will cease to exist here. That is why the Titans allowed us to bring you back from death when you fell from the plane."

Lorelei frowned. "So I DID die?" she asked. The three cats nodded. "Wow, and here I thought that I'd somehow gotten a parachute or something somehow. I'll tell you what. You heal Junior here, and I'll see what I can do."

"If you help us destroy Allnian, we shall heal your Pokemon prior to the battle," a low, rumbling, reptilian voice said quietly. Lorelei whirled around to see a huge face peeking around a corner of the tunnel. It was scaly, it was huge, it was scary, it was...the creature that all but destroyed Violet City!

"Murderer!" Lorelei screamed, and threw herself at the beast before she could form a coherent thought. There was nothing flowing through her mind but pure rage. This thing had killed two of her team, and he would pay, even if he was a hundred thousand times bigger and stronger than she was. She would make him pay.

"Stop, Lorelei!" Austrealis cried, and Lorelei could feel Aurora's teeth biting through the back of her shirt, holding her back. "It was not him!"

"LIAR!" Lorelei screamed. "IT WAS HIM!"

"Lorelei," a soft, male, HUMAN voice said, "It wasn't him. Please, I need your help." Lorelei turned, still literally trembling with anger, to see the young man claiming to be the Tintian Gerahid that she had met while he had claimed that she was in a coma. She frowned. He was here. How was that possible? Austrealis and Borealis had assured her that no one would be able to get into the cave.

"It wasn't him, Lorelei," Gerahid said, his soft voice like a bucket of cold water. "It looked like him, had his power, and, given enough time, would have acted like him, but the Drago that attacked Violet City was NOT this Drago. It was a doppelganger, one of Lokrye's creations. Lorelei, you have to listen to me very carefully. This is very important. Everything you heard here was true. I saw this coming and tried to prevent it by bringing your hero, Devon Harding, into the future, but I failed. She is now in the clutches of Allnian, as is your Elite friend, Falkner. They are now undoubtedly without free will now, and will follow all of her commands without thinking. As will all of your team, whom Allnian has also captured."

Lorelei paled. "She...She did this?" she asked, not wantign to believe it.

"Yes, Lorelei," Gerahid said softly, "And unless you stop Allnian, then Lokrye will be released, and the world will fall into total darkness."

"At least that's your story," a harsh voice cut in. Lorelei, startled, looked back to where the giant dragon had been waiting patiently for her and Gerahid to finish, and saw that the giant dragon now had a gaping wound in the side of its neck, and a young woman with purple hair that she recognized from history books was standing beside it.

"Devon," Gerahid said, "What have you done?"

The young woman stared at him, her eyes dull and glassy, as if she were dead. "Won't the Titan Council flay you alive if you're discovered here? You know they will look, once they feel the death of a Protector. You better go, now."

Gerahid swallowed, and tears came to his eyes. "Lorelei," he said quietly, "Kill her. Kill her now or all hope for your world is gone. I have to go. Austrealis, Borealis, Aurora, this is her fight. Fight Devon only if Lorelei dies. But if Lorelei dies, just as a warning, then the world is doomed." The young man dissapeared as suddenly as if he had never been there.

Devon smiled, and began circling around Lorelei, a wicked-looking bullwhip in one hand, and a short sword in her other. "So, you're the mighty Lorelei that was going to take her place at Allnian's side?" she asked, grinning. "I think you're nothing but a wimp. Within hours, Allnian will free Lokrye from his prison, and she will rule this world from her throne, many yards above us."

Lorelei frowned. "What?" she asked, "What are you talking about?"

"You were called the Dark Queen, I've heard, in the future. But in this reality, you've gone soft, and you're on the wrong side. These Pokemon are evil. Allnian sent me to exterminate them, and any who were with them."

Lorelei swallowed. This was surreal. Here she had come to Allnian, and instead she had come face to face with her all-time hero, not as a friend, but as a mortal enemy. And herem in short order, she would have to fight her. "Here," Devon said, grinning, "Take the sword. I brought it for you." She tossed it to Lorelei's feet, "Defend yourself in combat, if you're able."

Elizabeth crept down the corridor, and couldn't believe her eyes. One of the most powerful Legendaries on the planet was lying dead, and it was all because of one teenage girl. She had to be taken down, now. She glanced back up the tunnel at her sixty men, all armed to the teeth with the latest weaponry and armor, and signalled them forward, and to release the Mewtwo that Ghrenda had given them, and the Mewthree that they had been assigned from the Specter Board of Directors. They had to take this girl down now.

Lorelei heard a whisper of movement from the tunnel behind Devon, and the girl whirled as man after man in black, bodyfitting armor tumbled around the corner, pointing and firing fully automatic weapons at her. Behind them, two creatures that looked naggingly familiar floated, firing Psybeam after Psybeam at Devon, while holding up a defensive Barrier between Devon and the men with weapons.

Devon grinned, and began whirling at the men, her whip flailing around like some live thing. Somehow, none of the bullets or Psybeams reached her. At one point, Lorelei thought she caught a flash of an infinetismal Barrier that appeared just as a bullet neared Devon, but she would never, in the future, be sure. When she reached the Barrier that the two Pokemon put up, she passed through it as if it were not there at all.

The men, unsure of themselves in the face of this new threat, began pulling back, but none could escape. Lorelei tried to block out what happened next, but it would haunt her dreams for years afterwards, as Devon systematically took down each and every man and Pokemon that stood in her way. When she was done, the blood-covered young woman turned to Lorelei, and grinned. "You're mine, Ice Queen."

And then, just that quickly, Lorelei and Devon, who was still covered with blood, were standing in front of the majestic form of Allnian. The great bird spread its wings, and seemed to smile as much as its beak would allow. It spoke in a slow, grating voice. "Hello, Lorelei Belle Winters. I've been expecting you."

Dun Dun dun……

I know what you're all thinking. "A MEWTHREE? THOSE AREN'T MADE YET!"

Says who? This is my fic, and, besides, in my fic, TR was NOT the people that made the Mewtwo/Mewthrees. At least not originally. There is another group that has the information, and has already made a Mewthree….

Tune in next time for the extra-long final chapter, and the preview for the sequel, Operation: Celebi. 


	16. The Great Battle of Our Time

This is THE final chapter, and it has fifteen pages in MS Word. This fic has been a lot of fun, a lot of hard work, a lot of frustration, and about 155 pages in MS Word, including this chapter and the preview at the end.

I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.

Gerahid glared at the other Titans. "Listen to me!" he roared, "I don't care if I've broken the rules again! We are in DANGER. Allnian has three Elites within her grasp. With those, she could free Lokrye, and then we would all be doomed!"

He looked around the metaphorical meeting room and couldn't believe that he had to explain this to them. Colleon, the head of the Pokemon Titans, was pacing back and forth, his eight, multi-colored tails waving back and forth slowly, and Tyfoner watched the eldest Titan intently. Inferno, as usual, was glaring at Gerahid. For some reason, the Water-type Pokemon Titan had never had very much affection for the Water-type Human Titan.

"How are we supposed to know if you are telling you the truth?" Inferno spat at him, the flames on his back burning in fury. "You have constantly shown a disregard for the Council's rules. You've gone to the Human Realm more times than I can keep track of."

Gerahid rolled his eyes. "Look," he said, "I know that you all disagree with my methods. But this is a REAL threat. We can't just ignore this threat!"

"We're not ignoring it." the soft voice of Colleon cut into Gerahid's rant. "Believe me." The wise one's lupine face turned towards the human, his silver fur rippling. "I know you too well to believe that you are making something up. But we cannot get involved. This is their matter."

Gerahid stared at Colleon. "Their matter?" he demanded. "We will all DIE if we don't intervene! They don't have any hope of repelling this attack."

Colleon's head drooped, and Tyfoner stepped forward to speak. "We know this, Gerahid," the majestic water type's voice rang out loud and strong through the room, "But Allnian is a Protector, and she orchestrated this entire thing. You know as well as I do that we have a policy of non-interference."

Gerahid sighed and scratched the back of his head frustratedly before replying to his Water-type Pokemon counterpart. "I know," Gerahid hissed, "But we cannot ignore this. You know that. I tried to help, but only made matters worse. I wish that I had never gotten Devon involved with this." He bowed his head. "I had thought that I was saving her from death when I brought her to the future. Instead, I have condemned the woman I love to a fate worse than death, and now I know that she must be killed."

Colleon opened his eyes, and looked at Gerahid with pity in his eyes. "We must all make difficult decisions," he said slowly, "To try to protect what we hold dear. You did your best, but it was not enough." He lowered his head, and laid down, staring at the floor. "Now I feel that I must make my own difficult decision." The massive beast closed his eyes, bracing himself, then opened them and looked at Gerahid. "My friend, you know that the penalty for disobeying the council is exile." Gerahid nodded, and looked the kind titan in the eyes, bracing himself for his punishment. "Therefore, it is my judgement that you shall be banished to Earth. If, however, you manage to defeat Allnian, then you shall have proved yourself worthy of returning to this council."

Gerahid blinked, and it was only then that he noticed the twinkle in Colleon's eyes. "Go now from us, and do not return. Unless, of course, you manage to stop Allnian."

Gertal looked up at the massive pinnacle of stone rising sharply up from the mountainous plateau, and smiled. "Sheer cliff," he whispered. He glanced around. His men had taken defensive positions against the base of the cliff, and were waiting for Eltan. The Seviper would be along shortly, he was sure.

They were, after all, very close to the main Blizzard base. HIS base, Gertal reminded himself. After this battle, he would take it back. The alliance that he had made several hours earlier would guarantee him that.

He turned to look at one of his runners. "Report!" he barked. The uniform denoted the runner as someone from one of his scouting regiments.

"Sir, Eltan and the other Blizzards are coming in from the South. They're main body will be here in three hours, but they've sent ahead an advance force. That will be here in approximately twenty minutes." the runner recited, standing stiff at attention.

Gertal nodded. "Understood. At ease, private. Go get something to eat, then report to the East Face. They're short a few men."

The runner swallowed nervously, and nodded once more, then ran towards the North Face's mess tent. Gertal sighed, and picked up his radio. "Attention all units," he said into it, "We have hostiles inbound. Activate Barriers and the X-205s, prepare for battle. Estimated engagement time is twenty minutes."

Lorelei stared up at Allnian and swallowed. "What is the matter, Lorelei?" Allnian asked. "You traveled thousands of miles to see me, but now that I am in front of you, you have nothing to say?"

For some reason, Lorelei felt a bond with Allnian. Almost as if she could trust her with anything. Lorelei shook her head. She needed her head. She wasn't sure what was going on, but she was pretty sure that Allnian was responsible. "Is it true what they told me about you?" Lorelei asked, voicing the question that had she had wanted to scream from the moment that the Legendary Cats had told her about it. "About you being Lokrye's chief executioner?"

"No," Allnian cooed, "It is absolutely not true. They, in fact, were the ones that were allied with Lokrye. I led the charge against Lokrye in the Great Battle."

Lorelei closed her eyes and tried to think, but something wasn't letting her. She wasn't sure what it was, but it was as if something were interfering with her ability to form rational thoughts. Suddenly a thought popped into her mind. "Do you know where Falkner and my team are?" she asked.

Allnian smiled and ducked her head. "Why, of course, dear child. I brought them, along with the two young boys, here for their protection. They were nearly killed by Borealis and his kin. You DO know that they tried to kill them when they kidnapped you, don't you?"

Lorelei shook her head, trying to clear it. She needed to think, but something wasn't letting her. "Can I see them?" she heard herself ask.

"Why, of course!" Allnian said, and the majestic bird leaped into the air and lorelei could see Falkner, Lukas, his friend, and her team. She heaved a sigh of relief, then noticed something.

"Junior is healed," she breathed, and sunk to her knees. Her team ran towards her, their faces a picture of joy. There was something wrong with this picture, Lorelei knew, in the back of her mind. Something was wrong. What was it?

Then she had it. Frocarin was happy. Frocarin was never happy, at least not in his short experiences with him. Frocarin was a loner, a grumpy, non-happy, non-joyful, grouch of a loner.

Lorelei's eyes narrowed and got to her feet. "What have you done to them?" she asked Allnian quietly. Suddenly, whatever had been clouding her mind was gone. She could think clearly. And her team stopped, halfway to her. Their faces changed, too. From one of joy to clearly mavelolent.

"So," Allnian said in a casual tone. "You notice that they have changed. But that is because they have found their true god, Lont. My master. They know what he is like, and they have been transformed."

"Lont is nothing more than that sniveling coward Lokrye, Allnian!" a familiar male voice jabbed out accusingly. It was painfully loud. "What'sthe matter? Can't he face me himself?"

Lorelei shook her head to clear out the last of the webs, and suddenly realized that the voice had come from directly behidn her. She whirled around, for the first time taking in the breathtaking spectacle that surrounded her. They were on top of Sheer Cliff, she realized. The very top. The blue sky was absolutely clear, without a single cloud. There was no wind. And it felt as if all of the world were waiting for what was about to come. What was coming, she wondered.

"Titan," Allnian was saying, and she sounded surprised. "What are you doing here?"

"What I should have done a long time ago," Gerahid was saying as Lorelei turned around to see him standing there, behind her. "Remember two hundred years ago, when you released Lokrye? I should have killed you then. Instead, I banished you from Alto. I should have done a LOT more than that." He closed his eyes and held his hands outwards, palm up. "You will pay for all that you have done this day." he said slowly. Suddenly, from out of nowhere, two swords appeared in his hands, and he opened his eyes. "Your day of reckoning has come."

Allnian looked at him and laughed. "I have to admit, Titan, that I was surprised when I saw you there, but you are out-matched. While in the Titan dimensions, you would be powerful beyond reckoning, here you are little more powerful than an Elite. And, in case you hadn't noticed, I have two. One I believe you know, but my Flying Elite is rather new."

Gerahid glanced at Devon, then over his shoulder at Falkner. Lorelei held her breath, wondering what he would do. Gerahid smiled at her reassuringly, then dropped his swords. "You're right," he said, looking back to Allnian, "It does appear as if you have me in a bind. Two to one against me. There's something you forgot, however."

Allnian, her violet eyes twinkling, took a step towards the human, and looked down at him imperiously. "And, my arrogant little friend, what is that?"

Gerahid smiled, "There is another Elite here that is NOT within your grasp." With that, he turned, and tackled Lorelei to the ground, his hands pressed against her head. Lorelei screamed as a sudden influx of knowledge seared through her mind. She knew things that she simply hadn't before.

She knew how every clump of snow had gotten where they were. She knew that somewhere, some kids were having a snowball fight. She knew that she was more powerful than she had ever been before. And she knew that Allnian was suddenly frightened.

"What have you done?" Allnian shrieked, throwing herself backwards, off of Sheer Cliff, and turning a somersault before she righted herself. "Devon, Falkner, take them!"

Lorelei rose to her feet, subconsciously noting that she hadn't used any of her muscles to do so, and that she was now firmly coated in ice. She didn't know how, but she knew that she was somehow controlling the ice. She held out her hands, and a pole of ice materialized seemingly out of nowhere, but she knew that it actually camefrom water molecules in the air freezing to form the shape, and that it was made of Nevermeltice.

"I've got Devon!" Gerahid shouted, "Take Falkner! You've got an advantage!"

Lorelei swallowed, and willed the ice that coated her to turn her towards the flying-type gym leader. But he no logner looked human. Where he ahd once had arms, he now had feather-filled wings. His legs were shorter, and his feet were now hooked talons. For a moment, Lorelei felt shock, and more than a little fear.

"If I could win the Allnian tournament three years in a row," she murmured to herself, "I should be able to defeat the thing that it was named after, and whatever it's done with Falkner." with a yell, she hurled herself at Falkner, knowing that this could only end one way. If everyone in one of the groups were killed.

Gerahid circled Devon cautsiously. She had been a dangerous young woman before Allnian had activated her Elite powers. Now, she was truly a force to be reckoned with. She flipped her hair over her shoulder. The purple berry dye, he noted, was beginning to come out, and, instead, it was returning to its pure white color. "What's the matter, lover boy?" she taunted him. "Aren't you going to attack me?"

Gerahid didn't respond, but instead felt a deep sense of sadness well up within him, as he knew that he had to kill her. He had no choice. If he did not, then she would kill; him. He steeled himself, then darted forward. She jumped backwards, and her left hand came up. He immediately dropped to the ground. Just in time, too. A thick, gooey, purplish substance shot out of her hand, and impacted on stone near the edge of cliff, and melted several feet away in seconds.

He rolled away from her and leaped to his feet, swords once again at the ready, and once again launched himself at her, but she once again raised her hand and sent another stream of acid flying his way, which he barely avoided. He shook his head. This was gonna be impossible if he relied only on his swords.

He eyed Devon, and began circling her. She matched his circling, her mouth upturned. To her, this was just some kind of twisted game. To him, it was a fight not only for his survival, but for survival of the entire world as he knew it.

He took a deep breath, and Devon tensed. He grinned, and began circling the other direction. She glared at him, and changed her trajectory accordingly. Then, Gerahid abruptly dropped his swords and brought both hands up, water pouring from his palms, and impacting squarely on Devon's chest. With a cry, she fell over the side of Sheer Cliff.

Gerahid closed his eyes, and reminded himself that it was for the best. He turned to face Allnian, and picked up his swords. He looked over at Lorelei, and saw that Falkner was nowhere to be found around her. And Lorelei was staring in horror at something behind Gerahid. Lorelei brought up her hands, and Gerahid dropped to the ground.

A beam of ice left Lorelei's hands, and impacted solidly with the stream of acid that barely missed Gerahid. The Titan completed his roll and got to his feet, in time to see Falkner dropping Devon to the surface of the cliff, before veering off towards Lorelei once more.

"Did you really think, Titan," Allnian taunted him, "That I would let one of my star performers die so easily?"

Gerahid groaned, then dodged to the left as Devon's bullwhip cracked to his right, then darted back to the right as another stream of acid flew through the air.

"They're at the top of the cliff!" the temporal agent snapped into his microphone. "I can see them up there." he peered through the scope of his sniper rifle at the battle that was unfolding at the top of the cliff. He looked up at the base of Sheer Cliff, and bit back yet another curse. "There's no way up. I'm sorry, Misty, but I'm afraid that we're too late once again." He ran a hand through his spiky brown hair and closed his eyes. He couldn't believe that there was nothing he could do. At the speed that Lorelei and whoever else were fighting up there, there would be no way he could hit them with a bullet for a clean kill.

"Ash," Misty Waterflower's surprised voice came through the radio, "The Great Destroyer is up there!" Ash Ketchum peered through his sniper rifle, and he could indeed see Allnian at the top of the cliff. He stiffened, and felt a chill run through him. It had been a long time since Allnian had been killed by Lorelei, the Dark Queen, but the sight of the legendary bird that had killed so many humans and Pokemon in the future made his blood run cold.

"Do you realize what this is?" Ash asked Misty, a chill running down his spine as he recognized the scene unfolding in front of him. "This is the start of the Battle for Nuschantz." Ash remembered hearing about the battle. It had lasted for weeks, initially, it had only been between Allnian, Lorelei, and several others that no one ever knew, fought a titanic battle. Then Team Blizzard began a massive battle amongst themselves in Nuschantz. Then...Ash shuddered. "We need to stop this before it begins," he said into his radio. "I'm taking her down." he looked through his scope, double-checked that he had the right target, and pulled the trigger.

Lorelei parried yet another attack from Falkner, and ducked down to avoid a blow, then stood to thrust her ice staff towards him, but instead felt something rip through her. Dimly, she saw blood spray out in front of her. She heard a high-pitched scream of outrage, but she wasn't paying attention.

Lorelei fell to her knees, and looked down. There was a growing stain of red growing from her chest. "That was my good shirt, too," she groaned as she collaped to the snow. She lay there, waiting for Falkner to finish her off. All she heard was the sound of Devon and Gerahid fighting, and Allnian wailing.

It took some effort, but she pushed herself up and looked to where Falkner had been. He, too, was lying in the snow. He, however, was in much worse shape than she was. She looked way and vomited, trying not to notice that the snow that was blood-stained was rapidly expanding from both of them.

Then Lorelei began to get over the initial shock and heard Allnian wailing over the sounds of a battle beginning far below. "No! My glorious empire!" She turned and glared at Lorelei. "I would have overthrown Lokrye himself. If I ever find who did this, I will skin him alive!"

Ash looked up from his scope. He had done it. He had shot Lorelei. His future was changed. Now the future would not have to be the fearful place that it had been for him. He felt a strange sensation, and looked at his hands. He was fading. It was hard to explaining, but he was literally disappearing. He grabbed his radio. "It's done, Misty. The future has been changed. They're free to make it a better place than it was for us."

Misty's soothign voice came back to him. "I know, Ash. I know. I don't know about you, but I'm dissappearing." she sounded relieved. Ash was pretty sure that she was. If she was just gone, then she wouldn't have to live with the memories that they had carried with them for so long.

"Misty," he said, noticing that the sniper rifle and the radios that they had brought from the future were dissapearing too, "I love you."

"I know." she replied. Ash smiled, and, just before he dissapeared, wondered what he would be like in this future. Certainly not the rebellios youth that single-handedly planned a successful rebellion, that was for certain. Those times...were over.

Gerahid dodged another stream of slime, then brought himself back around, and glanced over at Lorelei. He couldn't spare much attention to her, but he had to get over there and help her. He turned back to Devon, to see her shaking her head. "Whoa," she said, in that tone that he had come to know so well. Gerahid blinked. He knew that the Devon that Allnian controlled would never let her use such a...soft tone. "What was that?" she asked. "Was I asleep?" She looked up. "GERAHIDEOUS!" she shouted, and leaped on top of him.

The Tintian Titan, surprised, dropped his swords and barely managed to catch her before stumbling back and falling onto the ground. "Devon," he said, grimacing, "Now's not a good time."

"Oh," Devon snapped at him, "It never is, is it?" She looked up aand saw Allnian. "Oh," she said.

"Yeah." Gerahid replied, and shoved her off of himself.

"Big bad?" Devon asked.

"Yup," Gerahid said, getting to his feet and gathering his swords into his hands.

"We gotta kill it?"

"That's the general idea." Gerahid glanced over at Devon. "You have no idea how good it is to see you again.

"I KNEW you liked me!" Devon squealed. Gerahid rolled his eyes.

"They are dying!" Allnian wailed. "They are dying! I must waste no more time! Lokrye, hear me, before this hour is out, you shall be free once more!"

"Not if I have anythign to say about it!" Gerahid said, strepping forward confidently, his swords held at the ready.

"Me too!" Devon cried out, stepping forward threateningly.

Allnian's head turned towards them. "Really?" she asked, amused. "Well, fortunately, you don't have a say in it. I needed all four of you for th energy to pull Lokrye back into this dimension. Now that someone has shot Lorelei and Falkner, I will kill you all now." Gerahid lunged towards the bird, but she jumped into the sky, and Gerahid tumbled into the snow. Devon cracked her whip towards the Legendary, but Allnian grabbed it into her mouth and hurled it off the side of the cliff.

Allnian alighted on a drift of snow, and began to sing. The cliff shuddered, and the snow shook off of the drift, to reveal a throne, on which Allnian was sitting on the back. "Lokrye, hear me," the bird began, "I come before you with this offering. Four Elites. Take them, and drain them. With their energies, you may once again take your place as the ruler of this world!"

Allnian's cruel voice rang out among the mountains, and was drowned out by the sounds of battle below them. "The two forces," Gerahid realized, thinking out loud, "they are engaged in a battle for control of this land. I saw them before I was exiled."

Devon nodded. "Huh." She turned to Allnian, "I guess that he is sleeping or anything, because I don't feel drained."

Then Devon and Gerahid doubled over, both wracked with pain beyond belief. Their screams rose up and intertwined with those of Lorelei and Falkner.

Gertal brought his rifle around and fired off another shot. Another of the Doppelganger Blizzards fell. The main force of the Doppelgangers were now engaged with his comparatively tiny force. He did have the upper hand, however. He had gotten the most defensible location.

Still, he knew that there was no way that his men could hold out much longer. He fired off another shot, then glanced at his watch. Right about now, the cavalry would come. Sure enough, even as he was scanning the horizon, thousands upon thousands of men appeared, their Pokemon deployed in front of them.

Steven and Giovanni were right on time. Between them, they had the largest army in Nuschantz, and most of the men and women that had volunteered to come to Nuschantz to fight Eltan and his Doppelgangers. The Kantans, Johtans, and other trainers swept down like a flood, firing off shots into the vulnerable flanks of Eltan and Ghrenda's army.

The rear of the army collapsed, and there was a brief moment of confusion as the Doppelgangers hurried to regroup. Gertal smiled tightly. "Charge!" he shouted to his men and into his radio. This was their chance. The Doppelgangers were cauight between two forces, and, with them momentarily disorganized, it was the perfect time to launch an attack.

Somewhere, up above him, he heard screaming that was loud even over the cocaphanous sounds of battle. He tried to ignore it, and concentrate on the battle at hand. His men would let him know if it were anything dangerous. Right now, he had a battle to win.

Gerahid doubled over, screaming, and looked up at Allnian. The legendary had once been one of the great protectors of Earth, but had been corrupted by the Dark Titan, and had instead opted to betray her position and try to help Lokrye take over the world. He had almost stopped her from releasing her old master from the prison dimension that he had been put into, but now she was literaly draining his life energy so that Lokrye would have the power to return to this dimension.

Gerahid gritted his teeth and got to his feet defiantly. He looked around dazedly, and spotted his swords. He took one stumbling step towards them, but something roared in from behind him and knocked him down, and the swords off of the side of the cliff. "You will pay for betraying your one true god, Lokrye," Allnian informed him somberly, landing in front of him. "If you had decided to follow him, as I have, you would have survived the punishment he must deal the world. But, as it is, you and your girlfriend must die. What were you thinking, coming here? You don't even belong in this time!"

Gerahid closed his eyes, channeling the pain so that he could think. What had he been thinking? It had been extremely reckless of him. He forced himself not to listen to the screams of the other three Elites, and forced his eyes open. There! Past Allnian, all but forgotten. Lorelei's team, and the two children. Maybe they could do something.

"Forget about them, Titan," Allnian snarled at him, "If they were to take so much as a step towards me, they would be dead instantly. They know this. THAT is why they do not come to your defense." The bird almost looked like it was smirking at him. "What can you do, Gerahid? Behold, the portal is already forming!" Allnianleaped into the air, and Gerahid saw a blue-purple dimensional vortex begin to appear. To anyone that didn't know anything about dimensional vortexes, it would looke like bluish-purplish clouds swirling towards a central point like a whirlpool.

Gerahid closed his eyes. He had failed. He fell to his knees, the impact that normally wouldn't have affected him by such an action was magnified ten thousand times, and he cried out in pain. The pain brought a moment of sudden clarity. Devon didn't belong in this time period. If she were to remain here, it would probably cause a flux in the time-space continuum, and that would be bad.

He forced his tired bones to crawl over to Devon. "I'm sorry, Devon, but I have to send you back to your own times." Her back arched in pain, and her screams of pain doubled, but he knew that she had heard. And he knew how she felt, too. The pain that he was just barely keeping control of was getting worse. He had to act now, or he would never be able to act. He kissed Devon on her lips. "I just wish that I wasn't sending you back to die."

He grimaced and rolled onto his back, next to Devon, and stared at the portal. None of these Elites would be able to comprehend what he would do next, he knew. Their power was limited to this dimension, as was Allnian's, for the most part. While Allnian couldn't make a vortex to bring Lokrye through, she COULD use brute force and punch a hole to the prison dimension where Lokrye was. Through that hole, Lokrye would then open a vortex, through which he could return and conquer this world. While Devon, Lorelei and Falkner couldn't do the same as Allnian if they had a hundred years, Gerahid had a way of stopping Lokrye that he doubted Allnian had counted on. The hole, he knew, was likely a temporary one, beause a permanent hole in the space-time continuum would take more energy than even ten Titans put together could ever have. Therefore, Lokrye had a very narrow margin to make the vortex. Also, a vortex, once begun, could be manipulated by any other Titan.

It was this last part that Gerahid was going to take advantage of, and the former that made him sure that this would never happen again. Gritting his teeth against the pain, he raised his hands and began manipulating the vortex. Almost immediately, a searing flash of silver strobed through the partially complete vortex, and seared into his body. He screamed, but never stopped. He was willing to bet, that even in his sub-standard state, he would be able to hold off, because of the substantial power losses that were connected to non-vortex intra-dimensional energy transfers.

Another silver beam roared through the the vortex, and another. The attacks became more and more frequent, and Gerahid was pretty sure that that meant that the interspacial hole was closing up. He gritted his teeth, and suddenly he was in the clear. The pain that was wracking him was gone, but he knew that he would not be able to take on Allnian now. He himself had been nearly drained. He could only imagine what it had done to Lorelei, Falkner, and Devon.

"Insolent human fool!" Allnian screamed, now finally taking notice of him for the first time since she had left him before. "What have you done?"

Gerahid forced a grin onto his face as he looked up to look at the rapidly descending bird. His bones felt as if they were grinding each other to dust.. "What I should have done a long time ago." he said. "I am killing you."

Allnian laughed as she alighted just out of Gerahid's reach. "What do you mean, kill me? With your powers now, there is no way that you can take me." Allnian straightened herself, and glared down at him imperiously. "I, however," she said menacingly, "Can kill you easily."

Gerahid grinned at her, one of his eyes closed. "If you try, you'll have to fight all the Menill behind you that seem to want to have a word with you."

Allnian looked at him uncertainly, then looked over her shoulder. If the bird had had skin, Gerahid was sure that it would have paled. Menill, as almost every Altan believed, thought of themselves as the stewards of the shrines to Allnian that dotted the Altan landscape. In actuality, nothing could be further from the truth. In actuality, Menill hated Allnian. Because Allnian had joined Lokrye, and had wiped out most of their race, after Lokrye was defeated, they swore that they would never let Allnian's memory be laid to rest until they had taken their revenge.

So they had created shrines around Alto, the birthplace of Allnian, that detailed, in Menill, the atrocities that Allnian had done, and described what they would do to her if they ever found her.

"What have you done?" Allnian screamed at Gerahid as the Psychic grabbed ahold of her with their six-fingered hands, and dragged her through the vortex.

Geraid stared after her as the vortex he had rerouted to modern-day Alto closed. "What I should have done a long time ago," he murmured. "I have wiped your treachery from this world. No longer will we have to fear Lokrye's Executioner. Now the world can live free. Finally, it's over."

Lorelei opened her eyes, and saw green fabric stretching up and away from her. She frowned, and tried to sit up, but a sudden searing pain in her chest fall back to the bed with a grunt against her pillow. "She's awake!" a familiar voiceexclaimed, and she heard someone running towards her.

"Lorelei, are you okay?" a concerned face framed by purple hair leaned into her line of sight. "Thank goodness," he breathed. "Falkner woke up three hours ago, but we were worried about you."

"What.." Lorelei groaned, and put a hand to her head. For some reason, it was hurting. "I'm gonna pound whoever did this to me," she mumbled.

"Hey Lorelei," came Falkner's voice from the opposite side of her bed than Bugsy. "Good to see you up." Lorelei turned her head and saw that the room that the sterile room that she was in had a door on that side, and Falkner was just coming through in a wheelchair. "Er," he amended, after a short pause, "Not exactly up, but..." He cleared his throat. "Anyway, Bugsy's certainly happy. He's been by your bed the entire time you've been out, they tell me." Lorelei turned over to look at Bugsy, who blushed and looked away. "I think he's got a crush on you." Falkner said playfully.

Bugsy mumbled something that Lorelei couldn't make out, and opened his mouth to say more, but his cell phone rang. He took it out and flipped it open. "Bugsy," he said. He listened for a few minutes, then sighed. "It's the new Elite Four," he said, "I've gotta go for an hour or so for a meeting." He looked down at Lorelei. "It's good to see you again," he said softly, then hurried out of the room, and Lorelei could see the back of his neck burning.

She turned to Falkner. "Johto doesn't have an Elite Four," she said. "What is he talking about?"

Falkner grinned. "There's a lot to go over. It's been a month since..." he stopped and shuddered. "since it happened."

Lorelei frowned. "What? What happened?"

Falkner gave her a weak smile. "Since your battle with Allnian," came a strong, familiar voice to her left. She frowned and looked towards the voice. It was a man. For some reason, it seemed like she should know who he was, but she couldn't quite place his face. How had he gotten there? Just moments ago, she had looked there when Bugsy had been there, and this new man hadn't been there! "I'm sorry, but I took the liberty of suppressing your memories of what happened in Nuschantz until I could speak with you. I've already had this talk with Falkner, so he's got his memories back." the man took a deep breath and reached out his hand and placed it on Lorelei's forehead.

For a few moments, nothing happened. Then, memories rushed through her mind. Her eyes widened, and she found herself screaming at what she remembered. By the time that the last of the memories flashed through her mind, she was little more than a little child whimpering in her bed. "Did—" she stopped, and tried unsuccessfully to compose herself. "Did that really happen?"

The man that she remembered as Gerahid nodded. "I'm afraid so. Now, Lorelei, it is imperative that you speak of this to no one. If anyone knew that you were once an Elite, then the followers of Lont would be all over you."

Lorelei nodded slowly, then frowned. "Once an Elite?" she asked hesitantly. "I'm confused. I mean, the Cats told me that I was an Elite, but you make it sound as if I weren't."

Gerahid bowed his head, then looked straight into her eyes. "Lorelei, when Allnian drained you of your life energy, it nearly killed you. If you hadn't been an Elite, it would have. As it is, you are no longer an Elite, and your lifetime has been shortened by at least a decade. However, once again, if anyone ever knows that you WERE once an Elite, then you would be hunted down and destroyed, especially now that Lokrye's most powerful lieutenant in this world is dead."

Lorelei nodded, not quite following, but pretty sure that she would sometime in the future. "Remember, Lorelei, that the followers of Lokrye are sometimes human, and that these humans are extremely dangerous. Use extreme caution, and, I have to remind you, don't tell ANYONE of anything about this. If you did, you would be hunted down and killed." Lorelei nodded, and watched as he vanished before her very eyes, with a silvery flash.

Lorelei turned to Falkner, and tried to recapture some of what she had been. "Looks like I've got a lot of catching up to do." Lorelei triedto smile, but the images of what had happened to her kept going through her mind. She closed her eyes and put her head down, and she began to cry.

Bugsy walked back to Lorelei's hospital room with a bit of a snap in his step. He had been asked to help organize the Johto's own Elite Four, due to the massive uprising of more than fifteen teams against Johto's central government and league, which he had been pivotal in putting down.

His victories had given him a confidence in every other region of his life. True, he had had a bit of trouble rooting out those Rockets from the Radio Tower and Team Psi from New Bark, but he had eventually won.

He opened the door to Lorelei's room to find her alone, and crying. He walked over to her. "Lorelei?" he asked. "What's wrong?"

She stared at him, with tears running down her face. "Everything, Bugsy. Everything's wrong."

He smiled at her and tried to cheer her up. "Shh. It's all right. You're in a freed Johto now, and we're doing better than ever before. You're alive, and the doctors tell me that you're almost one hundred percent. Plus, your trip to Johot was a success."

Lorelei stared at him. "What do you mean?" she asked.

He smiled. "Why, your Sneasel has his arm back. Didn't you know that?" Lorelei stared at him blankly for a moment, then threw herself at him, and enfolded him in a hug, and began crying again, but this time, they were tears of joy. Bugsy thought about the young woman that he was holding, and about how special she was. Maybe in the future, they could have some kind of relationship beyond simple friendship. He'd just have to see how that worked out. He smiled as she hugged him tighter still, and her tears continued to flow.

"Sh," he said softly. "It's going to be all right."

THE END.

Well, I've finally got this all formatted, and now I can upload it. I hope that you have enjoyed this. And don't worry, Lorelei will be in the next fic. Will you please read it? 


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